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THE TUNNEL 




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THE TUNNEL 


BERNGARD KELLERMANN 


NEW YORK 

THE MACAULAY COMPANY 
1915 



Copyright, 1915, by 
THE MACAULAY COMPANY 



APR !0 I9i5 

©Cl.4:j98289 

Ro/ , 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAET I PAGE 

I Mac Allan, Engineer 11 

II The Best Brain in the World .... 28 

III A Shadow 32 

IV Preparation 35 

V Hard at Work 40 

VI The Conference 43 

VII Triumph 55 

VIII The World is Stirred 59 

IX The Work Begins 63 

PART II 

I Uncle Tom” 71 

II Time Tells 88 

III Woolf 97 

IV The Public Comes In 101 

V A Busy Man’s Wife 104 

VI Maud’s Resolve 112 

PART III 

I Into the Darkness 117 

II Forward! 122 

III Change 126 

IV The Game of Patience 129 

V The Work Grows 135 

VI Spring Tide 141 

VII The Epic of Iron 148 

VIII The Eternal Triangle 151 


CON'TENTS 


CHAPTER PAET IV PAGE 

I "The Song op Mao’’ 159 

II The Great Catastrophe 165 

III Panic 175 

IV Suspense 184 

V "Let Mao Pat!” 188 

VI On the Rack 194 

VII Into the Pit 201 

VIII The Reckoning 208 

IX The Strike 214 

PART V 

/ 

I Revolt 221 

II Back Eire 230 

III At the Wheel Again 234 

IV Clouds on the Horizon 238 

V The Gentle Art op High Finance . . . 242 

VI Lloyd’s Warning 249 

VII Called to Account 253 

VIII The Specter 263 

IX Small Change, Please! 267 

X Fire! : 270 

XI Allan Escapes 272 

XII Hunted 274 

PART VI 

I Fighting Alone 281 

II Plans Aglet 289 

III Burnt Bridges 296 

IV The Tide Turns 301 

V Full Speed Ahead! 308 

VI The Light prom Beyond 314 

Conclusion 316 


PART I 




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THE TUNNEL 


PAKT I 

I 

MAC ALLAN, ENGINEER 

The New York season reached its climax with the opening 
concert in the newly-built Madison Square Palace. There 
was an orchestra of two hundred and twenty performers, 
every single one of whom was a musician of repute. The 
most famous living composer had been secured specially for 
the occasion as conductor. The unprecedented fee of six 
thousand dollars was to be paid him for the evening. 

The prices of the tickets astonished even New York. No 
places were to be had for less than thirty dollars, and the 
speculators in seats had driven the price of a single box up 
to two hundred dollars and more. The figure would not 
frighten away anybody who needed, or wanted, to cut a dash ! 

Towards eight o^clock Madison Avenue and Twenty-Sixth, 
Twenty-Seventh and Twenty-Eighth Streets were crammed 
with motor-cars. The dealers in tickets, their hands full of 
dollar bills, their faces streaming with perspiration despite 
a temperature below freezing-point, darted in and out reck- 
lessly between the wheels. They sprang up on the steps, 
and on the seats by the chauffeurs, sometimes even on the 
roofs of the cars, their harsh voices rising above the din of 
the traffic: ‘^Here you are! Here you are! Two stalls, 
second row ! Two Grand Circle seats ! Here you are ! ^^ . . . 
A sharp hail storm swept down upon the moving mass like 
grape shot. 

The moment the window of a car was lowered, there would 

II 


THE TUNNEL 


12 

be fresh cries of ^^Herel^^ and a zigzag race of competing 
vendors to it. The drops of sweat on their brows had time 
to freeze during the few seconds which passed while they 
disposed of their tickets and pocketed the money. 

The concert was timed to begin at eight o^clock, but at 
a quarter past there were still endless rows of cars waiting 
their turn to draw up in front of the portico, glowing a warm 
red in the cold damp air, which formed the entrance to 
the brilliantly illumined foyer. A stream of gayly attired 
pleasure seekers flowed from the cars into the theater, watched 
with imceasing interest by two rows of soberly clad onlookers 
on each side of the portico, their attention caught now by 
some priceless fur, now by a cluster of diamonds in the hair, 
here by a gleam of silks, there by a dainty foot. 

The plutocracy of Fifth Avenue, as of Boston, Philadelphia, 
Buffalo, and Chicago, filled the ornate, overheated Concert 
Eoom, splendidly decorated in red and gold. The manipula- 
ting of thousands of fans kept up a constant vibration of the 
air. At times a wave of almost overpowering scent seemed 
to rise above the subtle and • pervading aroma produced by 
the plaster and lacquer work and the still fresh paint upon 
the walls. Innumerable rows of electric lamps shone so bril- 
liantly from the arches of the roof and from the encircling 
galleries that only strong eyes could bear the light. 

Into the ears of this fashionable audience, almost as ultra 
modern as the Concert Room itself, poured forth the music 
of the grand old masters, long since out-moded. 

Mac Allan, the well-known engineer, with his young wife 
Maud, occupied a small box just over the orchestra. He was 
indebted for this to his friend. Hobby, the architect of the 
building. He had not come up from Buffalo, where he had a 
manufactory of steel implements, to listen to music, of which 
he had no kind of understanding, but with a view of securing 
a ten minutes^ interview with Lloyd, the great banker and rail- 
road magnate, the most powerful man in the United States, 
and one of the richest in the whole world — an interview of 
the utmost importance to him. 

During the afternoon in the train, Allan had had to fight 


MAC ALLAl^, ENGINEER 


13 


against a kind of nervous excitement, and again, a few 
minutes ago, on noticing that Lloyd^s box, on the opposite 
side, was empty, he had been a victim momentarily to this 
strange feeling of feverish agitation. Now, however, he was 
himself again. 

Lloyd might not appear at all, he reflected. Probably he 
did not come very often. Even if he did come, nothing might 
result from the interview, despite Hobby’s triumphant tele- 
gram. 

Allan sat there quietly, like a man who knew how to wait. 
He lounged in his seat, his broad shoulders well back, his 
legs stretched out the whole length of the box, and gazed 
calmly round at the house. He was not a big man, but he 
was squarely and strongly built, like a boxer. His head in 
particular was square and massive, his complexion was un- 
usually dark. His skin looked sunburnt even now in the depth 
of winter. His carefully parted hair was brown, and shone 
like copper in the glare of the electric lights. His eyes were 
deep set, beneath prominent eyebrows; they were of a light 
bluish-gray, with an expression of almost childlike good- 
humor. You would probably have placed him as a naval 
oflBcer, just home on leave, and not quite at ease in his dress 
clothes : a healthy, hearty specimen of humanity, a bit rough 
perhaps, but not unintelligent — not a notable personality in 
any way. 

He whiled away the time as best he might. The music 
had no effect on him beyond interrupting his thoughts and 
preventing him from keeping them concentrated upon any- 
thing. He noted the dimensions of the immense hall, with 
its tiers of boxes and its lofty roof. His eyes wandered over 
the sea of waving fans in the stalls and he reflected that there 
was a lot of money about in New York, and that this assuredly 
was the place for inaugurating such an enterprise as his own. 
His brain, practiced in such matters, began working out a 
calculation of what the lighting of the hall would cost per 
hour. He decided that it must amount to about a thousand 
dollars. Now he applied himself to the study of the indi- 
vidual faces among the men in the audience — ^women had no 


14 


THE TUNNEL 


interest for him. His glance traveled back to the orchestra 
immediately in front of him. As is the case with all who un- 
derstand nothing of music, he was astounded by the mechan- 
ical precision with which the members of the orchestra 
played. He leaned forward a little to scrutinize the conduc- 
tor. This slenderly built, narrow-shouldered man with the 
distinguished bearing, who was being paid six thousand 
dollars for the evening, was to Allan an enigma. He watched 
him long and attentively. It was an unusual head. With 
its hooked nose, its bright alert eyes, its compressed thin- 
lipped mouth, and hair flowing back from the forehead, it 
had something of the vulture about it. The man seemed all 
skin and bone and nerves. But he stood there calmly amid 
all the chaos of voices, silencing them at will with a motion 
of his white, fragile-looking hand. Allan marveled at him, 
as at a magician into whose power and mysteries he could 
not even try to penetrate. He thought of him as of a 
survivor from an era long past and belonging to a strange 
unintelligible foreign race that soon would be extinct. 

At this moment the conductor threw up his hands with a 
convulsive movement. There was a deafening climax and 
then suddenly the orchestra was still. 

An avalanche of applause swept through the immense hall. 
Allan, with a sigh of relief, made a movement as though to 
rise from his seat, but the music was not done with yet, they 
were beginning the Adagio. From a neighboring box came 
the fragment of a conversation . . . ‘^ Twenty per cent, man ! 
As good a thing 

Constrained to sit still a little longer, Allan set himself to 
a study of the construction of the tier of boxes, which puzzled 
him a little. His wife, on the other hand, herself something 
of a pianist, had abandoned herself heart and soul to the 
music. Maud looked small and fragile alongside her hus- 
band. She sat leaning forward, her delicate madonna-like 
head with its dark brown hair rested on her gloved hands, her 
ears drinking in the music that came in waves from every 
direction. The intense vibration produced by the two hun- 
dred instruments thrilled to the utmost every nerve in her 


MAC ALLAN, ENGINEER 


15 


body. She gazed out into the distance with unseeing eyes. 
The intensity of her emotion was betrayed by two round 
hectic spots on her soft smooth cheeks. 

Never, so she thought, had music moved her so profoundly, 
never certainly had she heard such music. A simple melody, 
some scarcely perceptible refrain, could always awake in her 
a feeling of inexpressible delight. A single note could touch 
a vein of joy in her nature that would well out and flood her 
whole being with happiness. The music to which she listened 
this evening brought her to a state of sheer ecstasy. The 
faces conjured up by it in her memory seemed etherealized. 

Maud’s life had been as quiet and uneventful as her appear- 
ance suggested. It had been marked by no outstanding 
incidents, and it resembled that of thousands of other girls 
and women. She was born in Brooklyn, where her father had 
a printing business, and she had been brought up on a little 
estate among the Berkshire Hills by her devoted mother, a 
German. She had had the benefit of a good school education, 
had spent two summers at the Chautauqua Summer School, 
and had amassed quite a large store of wisdom and knowledge 
in her small head, only to be speedily forgotten. 

Although she had shown no unusual gifts for music she had 
acquired some proficiency as a pianist and had had " finishing 
lessons” from teachers in Munich and Paris. She had 
traveled with her mother (her father had died long ago), and 
had taken part in sports and games, and had done a little 
flirtation like most young girls. She had had an early love- 
affair to which she no longer gave thought: she had refused 
Hobby, the architect, who had lost his heart to her, feeling 
that she could never care for him except as a friend ; and she 
had married Allan because he had taken her fancy. Before 
their wedding her mother had died. In the second year of 
their marriage, a little girl was born to them whom she 
idolized. That was all. She was twenty-three years old 
and happy. 

As she sat there bewitched, drinking in the music, a world 
of memories seemed to come and go before her eyes, defined 
with wonderful clearness and fraught with deep emotion. 


16 


THE TUNNEL 


Her life seemed to take on a new and deeper, richer signifi- 
cance. She saw again the face of her little mother, all sweet- 
ness and spirituality, then the Berkshire Hills, through which 
she had often driven as a girl. It seemed flooded now with a 
mystical, shining beauty. She thought of Hobby and the 
scene changed to her own little room, her den,^’ packed full 
with books. She saw herself as she used to sit playing the 
piano. Then Hobby reappeared. He sat near her on the 
edge of a tennis lawn. It was late in the afternoon and so 
dark that one could only just make out the markings of the 
court. Hobby sat with one leg over the other, letting his 
racquet fall against the tip of his white shoe, and talked away. 
She saw herself laughing, for Hobb/s talk was all delightful 
nonsense. Then one of his cheekiest jokes came to mind and 
Hobby himself vanished, and she was at the merry picnic 
at which she first saw Mac. She was on a visit to the Lindleys 
in Buffalo, and it was summer time. In the forest stood two 
motors, and the party numbered a dozen, men and women. 
She could see the faces of every one of them all quite dis- 
tinctly. It was hot, the men were in their shirt-sleeves, the 
ground was baked. It was time to make tea and Bindley 
cried out : " Allan, will you start the fire ? Allan replied, 

^‘All right And it seemed to Maud that already then 
she had come to love his deep, rich, resonant voice. She 
sat watching him make the fire. How hard he worked, bend- 
ing and breaking the branches, unnoticed by all the others. 
She saw how, with his shirt-sleeves rolled up, he crouched in 
front of the fire, blowing at it to make it kindle. Suddenly 
she noticed the tattooed marks on his forearm: crossed 
hammers. Now she drew Grace Gordon^s attention to this, 
and Grace (the same Grace who had just been in the Divorce 
Court) looked at her, astonished, and asked : Don’t you know 
about it, dear ? ” And went on to tell her that Allan had been 
one of the pony boys ” in the famous Uncle Tom ” mine, 
and to give her an account of this sunburnt young fellow’s 
romantic boyhood. Meanwhile, there he remained, crouching, 
quite regardless of the laughing, chattering party, entirely 
absorbed in his work, and she loved him at that very moment. 


MAC ALLAN, ENGINEER 


17 


Yes, certainly she loved him then already, although until now 
she had not known it. And Maud abandoned herself to the 
thought of her love for her husband. Her thought went 
back to his wooing of her, to their engagement, to the first 
month of their marriage. And then to the time when her 
little girl was on her way into the world and arrived ! Never 
would she forget Mac’s solicitude and tenderness and devotion 
at this time — a time when every wife is able to gauge her 
husband’s love. Maud’s heart welled over with love and she 
closed her eyes. The familiar faces, the old memories, van- 
ished and the music carried her away. She thought no 
longer, she was all feeling. 

A crash like the shattering of a wall broke suddenly on 
her ear, and she awoke and drew in her breath. The Sym- 
phony was at an end. Mac was standing up and leaning 
out of the box. There was a swaying to and fro in the 
stalls. 

A little dizzy, Maud stood up and began suddenly to clap 
her hands with wild enthusiasm. 

Clap, Mac, clap ! ” she exclaimed to her husband, almost 
beside herself with emotion. 

Allan laughed at her unwonted excitement and clapped 
several times to please her. 

“ Bravo ! Bravo ! ” Maud cried out in clear ringing tones, 
leaning over the front of the box, her moist eyes showing 
how deeply she was still affected. 

The conductor wiped the perspiration from his thin pallid 
face and bowed again and again. As, however, the clapping 
did not cease he pointed modestly to the orchestra with his 
outstretched hands. This gesture was manifestly insincere 
and called forth Allan’s ineradicable mistrust of all artists, 
whom he never regarded as being really men and whom 
he often declared to be useless. 

Maud, however, threw herself wholeheartedly into the new 
outburst of applause. 

" My gloves have burst ! Look, Mac ! ” she exclaimed. 
" What an artist he is ! Wasn’t it wonderful ! ” Her face 
was radiant, and to her husband she looked strangely beautiful 


18 


THE TUNNEL 


in her delight. He smiled and answered, as enthusiastically 
as he could. ^^Yes, he’s a remarkable fellow.” 

Oh, he is a genius! '' exclaimed Maud, and she continued 
her clapping. have never heard anything like it any- 
where, not in Paris even, or Berlin, or London ! ” She was 
interrupted by the opening of the door of the box and the 
arrival of their friend, the architect. 

Hobby!” she cried. ^^Do clap. Hobby, we must make 
him come out again! Bravo! Bravo! Bravo!” 

Hobby responded by emitting a piercing guttersnipe’s 
whistle. 

"Hobby! Hobby! How dare you!” And she stamped 
her foot indignantly. But the conductor reappearing at this 
instant, she began clapping afresh. 

Hobby waited until the noise died down. 

" They’ve all gone stark staring mad,” he said with a ring- 
ing laugh. " My whistle was only to add to the row. But 
how are you, Maud, old girl ? How are you, Mac, old chap ? ” 

It was their first opportunity that evening for having a real 
talk together. 

The friendship between the three was a very genuine and 
strangely intimate one. Allan knew all about Hobby’s former 
relationship with Maud and although the two men never 
discussed it, it constituted a peculiar bond between them. 
Hobby was still a little in love with Maud, but he was tactful 
enough not to display it. Maud’s womanly instinct, on the 
other hand, did not allow her to be ignorant of the fact. In- 
deed, she derived not a little satisfaction from the knowledge, 
as the tender warmth in her brown eyes seemed to show, and 
she rewarded him with a sisterly affection. All three had been 
able at different moments in their lives to be of use to each 
other, to render each other real services, and Allan in par- 
ticular felt under a deep debt of obligation to Hobby, who had 
enabled him to raise a sum of fifty thousand dollars for tech- 
nical experiments and the starting of his factory, giving per- 
sonal security for the loan. It was Hobby, moreover, who 
had submitted his great project to Lloyd, the railroad king, 
and arranged for the forthcoming interview. Hobby was a 


MACALLAN, ENGINEER 


19 


genuine admirer of Allan and was glad to do everything he 
could to help him. In the days when Allan had invented 
nothing hut the diamond-stone Allanite the architect used 
to go about asking his acquaintances, Have you met Allan, 
the inventor of ‘Allanite^? That’s a man of whom more 
will be heard presently.” 

The trio were wont to meet several times a year. The 
Allans came to New York or else Hobby visited them in 
Buffalo. In summer they went together regularly for three 
weeks to Maud’s little estate. Brook Farm, in the Berkshire 
Hills. 

They regarded their meetings as great events. They seemed 
to be back once more in the happy times of three or four years 
before, living over again the old happy hours of youthful 
intimacy. 

For some reason they had not met at all during this winter 
and their present delight was keener than ever. They scru- 
tinized one another from top to toe like great children and 
congratulated one another on their looks. Maud chaffed 
Hobby over his dandyfied patent leather boots, and Hobby in- 
spected Maud’s gown and Allan’s new dress clothes with the 
eye of a fashion expert. As always on these occasions, they 
asked one another a hundred questions, skipping inconse- 
quently from one subject to another. Hobby as usual had 
had all kinds of quaint and strange adventures to recount. 
Finally they came to the question of the concert and of the 
day’s events and of mutual acquaintances. 

‘^And how do you like the building?” inquired Hobby 
with a self-satisfied smile, for he knew what the answer would 
be. Allan and Maud never stinted him with their praise. 
They expressed their admiration of the entire hall. 

^^And the foyer?” 

Grand, Hobby!” 

My only complaint about the hall,” said Maud, is that 
it is too gorgeous. I should have liked it to be cosier ! ” 

The architect smiled good humoredly. " Naturally, Maud! 
That would be quite right if the people came here to listen 
to the music. But such an idea doesn’t enter their heads. 


20 


THE TUlSnSTEL 


They come here to look about them and to be looked at. 
‘ Build us a fairy palace/ the committee said to me. ^ The hall 
must beat all records ! ^ 

Allan assented. What he had been most impressed by, 
however, was not the decorative splendor but the clever 
construction of the suspension tier of boxes. 

Hobb/s eyes twinkled with satisfaction. ‘^That wasnT 
at all an easy matter, he explained. It took a lot of 
thinking out. While the tier was being constructed, the 

whole concern rocked at every step, like this And 

Hobby rocked to and fro. The workmen had an anxious 
time of it.^^ 

“ Oh, you frighten me, Hobby,^’ exclaimed Maud, shrinking 
back nervously from the front of the box. 

Hobby smiled and stroked her hand. ^^You needn’t be 
afraid, Maud,” he said ; “ I told them that once the tier was 
completed, no power on earth except dynamite could — ^hullo ! ” 
An acquaintance in the orchestra had caught his eye and was 
speaking to him through a program rolled up to make a 
kind of megaphone. 

Hobby replied in tones which would have been audible in 
every part of the hall, were it not that every one else was 
talking simultaneously at the top of his voice. 

Hobby’s remarkable head was recognized by every one. 
He had hair of a pale canary color, very carefully smoothed 
and parted ; his face with its slightly tip-tilted nose, its almost 
white eyelashes, and its nonchalant, impudent expression, 
was typically English. Compared with Allan he was small 
and fragile, almost effeminately built. In a moment opera 
glasses were turned on him from all directions and his name 
was uttered on every side. Hobby had become one of Yew 
York’s most popular institutions and was one of the best liked 
men in Society. His talents and his eccentricities had quickly 
won him fame. Hardly a week passed without some fresh 
anecdote about him in the newspapers. 

Hobby was a genius at drawing flowers when he was four 
years old; at six he was a genius at drawing horses — in five 


MAC ALLAJSr, ENGINEER 


minutes he would cover a whole sheet of paper with them, 
going at full gallop; and now he was a genius in concrete and 
mortar and all the other constituents of sky-scraper 
buildings. He had had various affairs with women and when 
he was two and twenty he had played away a fortune of a 
hundred and twenty thousand dollars at Monte Carlo. Year 
by year he plunged deeper and deeper into debt, in spite of 
his enormous income, and without worrying over it in the 
slightest degree. 

One of his pranks had been to ride down Broadway on an 
elephant in the full light of day. Another was to live like 
a millionaire for four days, traveling in a train de luxe to the 
Yellowstone Park and returning home as a cattle-driver. He 
broke all records by playing bridge for forty-eight hours on 
end. Every street car conductor knew Hobby and was hail- 
fellow-well-met with him. Countless were the stories of his 
practical jokes. The whole of America had shaken its sides 
over one escapade of his, the occasion of which was the great 
air-race between New York and San Francisco. Hobby had 
made the flight as a passenger with the well-known million- 
aire sportsman, Vanderstyfft, and had scattered down from 
a height of 800 or 1,000 feet upon all the crowds collected to 
gaze up at them clouds of handbills on which were printed 
the words Come up, please, we have something to say to 
you ! Hobby himself had been so much in love with this 
particular prank that he kept it up throughout the two entire 
days which had been required for the 2,000 mile journey! 
Quite recently he had taken away the breath of New York 
with a sensational scheme for transforming the city into an 
American Venice. There being no more land in the business 
quarter to dispose of, he had suggested that gigantic blocks of 
skyscrapers, constructed of freestone, should be erected over 
the Hudson, East River and New York Harbor, connected to- 
gether by suspension bridges, high enough to allow the biggest 
ocean liners to pass beneath. The Herald had published his 
fascinating plans and drawings and New York had been 
thrilled by the idea. 


THE TUNNEL 


There was a good deal of the sensational journalist in 
Hobby. He was ^^out” to make people talk night and day. 
He could not exist without the lime-light. 

But, after all that, he was the most talented and the most 
sought-after architect in New York. 

His conversation with the orchestra concluded, he turned 
again to his friends. 

And now tell me more about my little friend Edith and 
what is she doing he said. The little girl was his god- 
child and he had already asked about her. 

No appeal was ever better calculated to touch Maud’s 
heart. At this moment she felt she really loved Hobby. 
She flushed with pleasure and a look of tenderness and grati- 
tude softened her brown eyes. 

^^She is getting sweeter and sweeter every day. Hobby,” 
she answered in tones full of motherly love. And you can’t 
imagine how clever she is becoming, too. She is beginning 
to talk.” 

Tell him the story of the hen ! ” interposed Allan. 

Oh yes, I must tell you that,” and Maud set herself to 
narrate a comic little incident in which a hen and the little 
girl played the leading roles. 

I must really see her again quite soon ! ” said Hobby. 

I’ll come and stay with you in a fortnight’s time. It has 
been dull in Buffalo, you tell me ? ” 

Deadly dull ! ” exclaimed Maud ; and her eyebrows went 
up in horror at the recollection, and a look of real unhappiness 
came into her face. ‘^You know, of course, that the Lind- 
leys have gone to Montreal?” 

Yes, that is a pity.” 

Grace Kossat has been away in Egypt since the autumn.” 
And Maud proceeded to open out her heart to Hobby. How 
dreary a whole day can be ! And how dreary a whole even- 
ing ! And in tones of mock reproach she added, And you 
know what sort of company Mac is, don’t you. Hobby? He 
neglects me worse now than ever. Often he doesn’t leave the 
factory all day. In addition to all his other treasures he 
has installed a whole lot of drills which bore away all night 


MAC ALLAN, ENGINEER 


23 


long through granite and steel and goodness knows what. 
He dances attendance on these drills as if they were invalids. 
He does really, Hobby. He dreams of them in his sleep ! 

Allan laughed out loud. 

‘^You let him go his own way,” replied Hobby, his eyes 
twinkling behind their pale lashes. '‘He knows what he’s 
about and you are not going to be jealous of a pair of drills I ” 

" I simply hate the things,” retorted Maud. " And don’t 
you imagine he would have brought me to New York if he 
hadn’t had business here ! ” 

" Oh, I say, Maud ! ” remonstrated Allan. 

But Hobby had been reminded by Maud’s remarks of the 
most important thing he had to say to Allan. A thoughtful 
expression came over his face. " Listen, Mac,” he said quietly, 
putting his hand on his friend’s arm, " I’m afraid you have 
come on from Buffalo to-day to no purpose. Old Lloyd 
is ill. I rang up Ethel Lloyd an hour ago, but she wasn’t 
sure whether they were coming. It will be bad luck if they 
don’t.” 

" Well, the interview need not necessarily come off to-day,” 
said Allan, disguising his disappointment. 

" In any case I shall hang on to his heels, Mac ! He shall 
have no peace! And now good-by for the present.” And 
Hobby vanished, reappearing next moment in a neighboring 
box occupied by three red-haired young ladies and their 
mother. 

The conductor with the vulture beak was back in his place 
now and a crescendo thundering from the drums filled the 
hall. The bassoons gave out a questioning and plaintive 
strain, which they repeated at a higher pitch and which the 
violins then took up from them and translated into their 
own tones. 

Maud abandoned herself again to the music. 

Allan sat beside her, a victim to anxiety and suspense. He 
regretted now that he had come at all. Lloyd’s proposal 
that they should meet in the box of a concert hall was not in 
any way surprising, in view of the remarkable character of 
the man and of the fact that he very seldom received any one 


24 


THE TUNNEL 


in his house; and Allan had not hesitated to fall in with it. 
He was quite ready to accept the explanation, if Lloyd was 
really ill, but he demanded the utmost respect for this great 
project of his, the colosaal nature of which sometimes almost 
overwhelmed him. Until now he had confided the secret of 
this enterprise, over which he had labored day and night 
for five years, to two men only : Hobby, who knew as well how 
to keep silent when necessary as how to talk when free so to 
do ; and now to Lloyd. He had not told even Maud about it. 
He felt that Lloyd ought to make his way to the concert hall, 
if it were in any way possible. At the least he ought to send 
a message making some other appointment. If Lloyd did 
not do this, well, he would have nothing more to do with the 
moody old man. 

The throbbing music, the glare of the lights, the flashing of 
myriads of diamonds, the mingling of many scents, the entire 
atmosphere of his surroundings, had the effect of crystallizing 
Allan^s thoughts. His brain worked quickly and clearly, 
although he felt suddenly excited. His great scheme was 
everything to him. By it he must stand or fall. He had 
devoted all his money as well as his energy to its preparation — 
to all the experiments, all the thousand and one preliminary 
investigations which it had involved. If it were not taken 
up, he would have to start his career afresh. The scheme 
was his whole existence. He reckoned up its chances like a 
mathematical problem. In the first place, he could interest 
the Steel Trust. The Trust had come off second best in the 
struggle with Siberian Iron and was now in a state of unex- 
ampled depression. It was ten to one that the Trust would 
back him. If it didn’t, he could fight it to the death. He 
could ‘^rope in” the great capitalists, the Morgans, the 
Vanderbilts, Goulds, Astors, Mackays, Havemeyers, Belmonts, 
Whitneys and all the rest. He could tackle the great banks. 
As a last resort, he could ally himself with the newspapers. 

By hook or by crook he would attain his goal. If necessary 
he could do without Lloyd. On the other hand, with Lloyd 
as his ally the battle was won; without him it meant a long 


MACALLAN, ENGINEER 


25 


and wearisome advance, and every square foot of ground 
would have to be battled for. 

He sat there, neither seeing nor hearing, his eyes gazing 
straight before him into space, working out his plan of cam- 
paign in all its smallest details. 

Suddenly a thrill seemed to pass through the audience, 
which had been held in rapt silence by the music. Heads 
began to move, diamonds to flash more brilliantly, opera 
glasses to be turned all in one direction. The orchestra had 
reached a piano movement and the conductor looked behind 
him, irritated by the whispering in the stalls. Something 
must be happening that had a greater effect upon the house 
than the magic of the two hundred musicians, the great con- 
ductor, and the immortal composer. 

From the next box came the words, muttered in a deep 
bass voice : She has the Rose Diamond on ... it belonged 

to Abdul Hamid . . . worth two hundred thousand 
dollars.^^ 

Allan looked up. The box opposite was dark — Lloyd had 
arrived. 

In the box, Ethel Lloyd’s delicate features could just be 
discerned. Her pale gold hair was recognizable by a sug- 
gestion of glistening, and on her right temple, now turned 
towards the audience, she wore a great diamond which shone 
like a pale red star. 

Look at that throat and those shoulders,” the bass voice 
in the adjoining box could be heard. ‘^Did you ever see 
anything like it? They say that Hobby, the architect — 

yes the man who was next door 

Oh, indeed ! One can quite imagine it,” rejoined another 
voice, with a notably English accent, and the speaker laughed 
softly. 

The back of Lloyd’s box was hidden behind the curtain, 
but Allan concluded from a gesture of Ethel’s that Lloyd 
himself was there. He bent down towards Maud and whis- 
pered to her, Lloyd has come after all!” 

But Maud had ears only for the music. She did not under- 


26 


THE TUNNEL 


stand Allan at all. She was perhaps the only person in the 
hall who was unaware of the arrival of Ethel Lloyd^ wearing 
her ^^Kose Diamond.^^ An emotional impulse, caused by 
the music, moved her to stretch out her hand gropingly 
towards Allan. Allan took it and stroked it mechanically, 
while a thousand quick, keen thoughts chased each other 
through his brain, and his ear took in fragments from the 
conversation which was being carried on hard by, jerkily and 
in whispers. 

‘‘Diamonds?^’ inquired a voice. 

Yes,” replied another. They say that is how he began. 
In Australia.” 

How did he make his money though ? By mining himself 
or speculating?” 

Neither. By running a hotel.” 

Do you mean to say he had no claim ?'” 

He had a peculiar claim of his own ! ” And the speaker 
laughed softly. 

‘‘How do you mean?” 

“ Well, they say he had a diamond mine of his own which 
did not cost him a cent. You know, of course, that the 
miners are searched . . . swallow the diamonds . . .” 

“ You don’t say so ! ” 

“Lloyd . . . doctored whisky . . . sea-sick . . . Lloyd’s 
mine ! ” 

“But that is incredible.” 

“ Well that is what people say. . . . And now you see him 
giving away millions of dollars for universities, observatories, 
libraries . . . But the man is an incurable invalid and lives 
in a constant state of nerves. Concrete walls several yards 
thick keep out all noise from his living rooms ... in fact 
a prisoner.” 

Maud at last turned towards the speakers remonstratingly, 
and they ceased speaking. 

During the pause. Hobby was seen making his way into 
Lloyd’s box and shaking hands in a cordial informal way 
with Ethel Lloyd. 

“ You see, I was right,” resumed the deep voice in the box 


MAC ALLAN, ENGINEER 


27 


adjoining the Allans. Hobby has all the luck ! Of course 
Vanderstyfft is still to the good . . 

In another minute. Hobby was back again with his friend. 
Come along, Mac,’’ he called out, ‘‘ The old man wants to 
talk to you.” 


II 


THE BEST BRAIN IN THE WORLD 

This is Mac Allan ! ” Hobby said by way of introduction, 
slapping his friend on the shoulder. 

Lloyd sat back in a crouching attitude, his head sunk 
forward in the dimly-lit box. He seemed neither to hear nor 
to see. After a while, however, he began to speak slowly 
and deliberately in a very hoarse, husky voice. I am very 
glad to meet you, Mr. Allan,^^ he said, I have gone thoroughly 
into your scheme. It is a big scheme, and ingenious, and 
practicable. I will do all I can to help.^^ And he stretched 
out his hand to Allan — a short, square-shaped hand, soft 
and moist and flabby, and turned his face towards him. 

Allan had been prepared for the experience by Hobby, 
but even so he had to exert all his self-restraint not to shudder 
as his eyes met Lloyd^s. 

Lloyd looked like a peculiarly hideous bull-dog. His lower 
jaw projected, showing some of the teeth. His nostrils were 
round holes, and the small, moist, lack-luster eyes were set 
like oblique slits in the sunburnt, dried-up, mask-like face. 
The head was absolutely bald. A loathsome skin affection 
had gnawed into scalp and face and neck. The spasmodic 
way in which his face worked was terrible, and it needed 
strong nerves to gaze on it unmoved. It reminded Allan of 
some Indian mummies upon which he had come once in 
Bolivia while engaged in railway work. These mummies were 
found in a crouching attitude, in big square chests. The 
teeth stood out between the dried-up lips. White and dark 
stones had been inserted as eyes, with a gruesomely realistic 
effect. 

Lloyd, who was well aware of his facial peculiarities, enjoyed 
the evident impression made upon Allan, and continued to 
study the young man’s features. 

28 


THE BEST BEAIN IN THE WOELD 


29 


" Yes, indeed,” lie went on to say. It is the most daring 
scheme I have ever heard of — and it is a practicable one.” 

Allan bowed, and replied that he was very glad to have 
enlisted Lloyd^s interest in it. It was a critical moment in 
his life, and yet — to his own astonishment — he was perfectly 
calm. On entering the box he had felt excited and nervous, 
but now he was able to answer Lloyd’s concise practical 
questions clearly and definitely. He could not well have 
accounted for the fact, but somehow he felt entirely at his 
ease with this extraordinary man, whose appearance, in com- 
bination with his wealth and his fame, would have discon- 
certed most others in his position. 

Have you got so far with your preparations that you 
could set forth your whole scheme in detail to-morrow?” 
Lloyd now inquired. 

^^I shall require three more months.” 

Well, don’t lose a moment,” said Lloyd in emphatic tones. 
"And you can count on me in every way.” Turning now 
towards his daughter, he introduced Allan to her. 

" How do you do, Mr. Allan ? ” Ethel Lloyd said cordially, 
looking him frankly in the face as she held out her hand. 
She had been watching him intently throughout the conversa- 
tion. 

Allan bowed, somewhat confused, for he was not much 
accustomed to talking with young ladies. 

It seemed to him that Ethel had used too much powder 
on her face. She put him in mind of a pastel, so soft and 
smooth was her coloring — the blonde hue of her hair, the 
blue of her eyes, and the delicate redness of her young lips. 
She had greeted him quite in the style of a grande dame, and 
yet in her voice there was something almost childlike which 
suggested that she was not really nineteen (as Hobby had 
told him) but much younger. 

Allan made some polite remark, smiling in a slightly em- 
barrassed fashion. 

Ethel continued to look at him observantly, the inquisitive 
girl in her blending with the woman of influence, conscious 
of conferring a favor by showing her interest. 


30 


THE TUNNEL 


Ethel Lloyd was a typical American beauty, her figure 
slight and supple, but womanly. Her hair was of that 
strangely delicate gold which other women, less fortunately 
endowed, refuse to believe natural. She had remarkably long 
eyelashes, on which faint traces of powder were perceptible. 
Her eyes were dark blue, and shone clear, though somewhat 
veiled by the long lashes. Her profile, her forehead, ears 
and throat were really beautiful and distinguished-looking. 
But on her right cheek could be detected the evidences of 
the dreadful illness which had disfigured her father. Light 
brown lines, almost hidden by powder, stretched up from 
her chin to a level with her mouth, like the fibers of a leaf, 
producing the effect of a birthmark. 

“I like discussing with my daughter everything that 
interests me keenly, Lloyd continued, ^^so you must not 
mind my having talked to her about your scheme. She can 
hold her tongue.^’ 

‘‘Yes, I can hold my tongue!” Ethel echoed laughingly 
and nodded her beautiful head. “My father and I have 
spent hours studying your scheme, and have talked and talked 
it over together until he became really enthusiastic about it. 
And he is really enthusiastic about it now, aren’t you. Papa ? ” 
Lloyd’s mask-like countenance remained motionless. “ Papa 
thinks very highly of you, Mr. Allan. You must come and 
see us, won’t you ? ” 

Ethel allowed her eyes to rest a moment on Allan’s, and her 
beautifully-formed lips curved in a gracious, happy smile. 

“ You are really most kind. Miss Lloyd,” Allan answered, 
smiling in his turn at her youthful ardor and her lively way 
of talking. 

Ethel liked his smile. She continued to look at him, noting 
in particular his strong white teeth. She opened her mouth 
to say something else, but at this moment the orchestra 
began again. Touching her father’s knee with her hand, by 
way of excusing herself for speaking — for he was an ardent 
music-lover — she whispered earnestly: “You have an ally 
in me, Mr Allan. I give you my promise that I shall not 
allow Papa to change his mind. You know he does change 


THE BEST BEAIN IN THE WOELD 


31 


his mind sometimes. I shall force him to carry this thing 
right through. Au revoir ! 

Allan shook her hand, with an inclination of the head 
which, it seemed to Ethel, might have been just a little more 
ceremonious, and the interview was at an end — ^the interview 
which determined the whole trend of his existence, and which 
began a new epoch in the relations between the New World 
and the Old. 

Stimulated and excited by his triumph, Allan went out 
of the Lloyds’ box with Hobby. 

As they opened the door they came suddenly upon a youth 
who had just time to step back and draw himself up, for he 
had evidently been stooping down, trying to hear what was 
being said inside. The culprit smiled engagingly. He was 
a reporter on the Herald, and had been told off to describe 
the evening from the social side. Quite unblushingly, he 
tackled Hobby, inquiring who his friend might be. 

Hobby eyed him good-humoredly. ^‘You don’t know 
him ? ” he exclaimed. This is Mac Allan, of the Allan 
Works in Buffalo, inventor of the Allanite Diamond-stone, 
champion boxer of the Green Eiver, and the best brain in the 
world.” 

The journalist laughed out loud. You are forgetting your 
own brain, Mr. Hobby ! ” he cried, and then, nodding toward 
the Lloyds’ box, he inquired in a whisper : Anything fresh 

there ? ” 

^^Yes,” answered Hobby, something startling. We are 
going to build a gallows a thousand feet high, on which, on 
July the fourth, all the New York newspaper men will be 
hanged ! ” 

Hobby’s joke duly found its way verbatim into the Herald 
next morning, together with an unrecognizable portrait of 
Mr. Mac Allan, inventor of the Allanite Diamond stone, whom 
^^C.H.L.” (Charles Horace Lloyd) had received in his box 
in order to discuss a project involving millions. 


Ill 


A SHADOW 

Maud was Stm in the music. But she was no longer 

able to listen with the same concentration as before. She 
had witnessed the scene in the Lloyds’ box. She was aware 
that Allan was busy upon some new project — “ a big thing ” 
to use his own phrase — some new invention or enterprise, 
but she had never asked him about it, for she had no knowl- 
edge whatever of things technical or mechanical. She re- 
alized also how important it must be for Allan to secure 
Lloyd’s support, yet she could not refrain from reproaching 
him in her own mind for choosing just this particular evening 
for the interview — ^the only evening in the year that he had 
taken her to a concert. She could not understand how he 
could think of business while such music was being played. 
The reflection kept recurring to her that she was out of her 
element in this America where there was talk of nothing but 
business, and that she would have been happier in the Old 
World where they understand how to separate work from 
recreation. But what troubled her most was the fear — so 
ready to be kindled in the heart of a loving wife — ^that this 
new ‘‘big thing” would take her husband away from her 
more than his work in Buffalo had ever done. 

A shadow had fallen over her happy mood, and lines showed 
on her forehead. Suddenly her face brightened and grew 
happy again. A joyous passage in the music, by some strange 
train of thought or feeling, had suddenly conjured up before 
her eyes a charming vision of her little girl, and she found 
herself carried away into a delicious day-dream of what the 
child’s life was to become. Yes, that was how Edith would 
grow up! . . . but the playful and joyous strains changed 
suddenly to a somber Maetoso sostenuto, and her sweet 
imaginings gave way to feelings of sadness and foreboding. 
Maud’s heart beat heavily. No, this music must not be 

32 


A SHADOW 


33 


allowed to foreshadow her child’s future. She ought not to 
allow herself to give rein to such fancies. She felt now she 
would like to interpose herself between Edith and this depress- 
ing music, and protect her from it, and she strove to direct 
her own thoughts elsewhere. 

The music now came to her aid, for it broke out into notes 
which created in her a feeling of vague, indefinable yearning, 
that approached ecstasy and banished thought. She was 
all ears once more. The swelling tones seemed to sweep her 
off her feet and to carry her along like a leaf in a whirlwind. 
Suddenly the wild emotional passage seemed to encounter 
a check like a wave broken by a rock, and the thunder of 
sound was shattered. To Maud it seemed as though she 
were compelled to sit still and think out some mysterious, un- 
known, unfathomable problem. The stillness following the 
storm was so intense that for the moment every one in the 
hall sat motionless, not a fan waving. 

Presently the voices broke out again, hesitatingly, falter- 
ingly (the fans were waving again now), and the uncertain 
restrained tones slowly and painfully making their way back 
to melody, induced in Maud a new mood of sadness. She 
was not happy, although Mac adored her and she idolized 
him ; no, no, there was something wanting. 

At this very moment Mac touched her on the shoulder and 
whispered into her ear. Excuse me, Maud — we are off to 
Europe on Wednesday. I have a lot of preparations to make 
in Buffalo. If we leave now we shall catch the night train. 
What do you say ? ” 

Maude made no reply. She sat silent and motionless. 
The blood rushed to her cheeks. Her eyes filled slowly with 
tears. Several minutes passed. She felt bitterly hurt with 
Mac. It seemed to her barbarous on his part to drag her 
away from the concert just on account of business pressure. 

Allan saw that her cheeks were flushed and that her breath 
came with difficulty. He still had his hand on her shoulder. 
He caressed her tenderly and whispered, All right, darling, 
let’s stay on. It was only a suggestion. We can go by the 
early morning train just as well.” 


34 


THE TUHHEL 


But Maud’s mood of happiness had gone now, not to re- 
turn. The music was hurting her now, and making her 
restless and miserable. She hesitated still a little whether to 
fall in with her husband’s anxiety to be off. A glance to- 
wards the Lloyds’ box made her aware that Ethel Lloyd had 
turned her opera glasses straight towards her. This decided 
matters. Forcing herself to a smile which Ethel Lloyd should 
see, she astonished Allan by looking at him affectionately 
with eyes still wet with tears and saying to him, ‘^Let us 
go, Mac!” 

She was pleased by Allan’s attentive bearing towards her 
as she rose to leave, and she seemed in one of her sunniest 
moods as she moved out of the box. 


IV 


PREPAEATION 

They reached the Grand Central station jnst as the train 
was moving out. 

Maud dug her small hands into the pockets of her fur coat 
and glanced at Mac from out of the collar which she wore 
standing up so as almost to cover her face. There goes 
our train, Mac ! she cried, laughing and taking no pains to 
conceal her glee. 

Behind them stood their manservant Leon, an old Japanese 
known generally as ^^Lion.” Lion was carrying the hand- 
baggage and was gazing at the vanishing train with a look 
of blank stupidity on his lined and shriveled countenance. 

Allan looked at his watch and nodded. ‘‘Too bad,” he 
said good-humoredly. “ Lion, we must go back to the 
hotel.” 

In the motor he explained to Maud that he minded the 
delay less on his own account than on hers, for she would 
have such a lot of packing to get through. 

Maud laughed softly. “How do you know I am coming 
with you, Mac ? ” she asked. 

Allan looked at her in astonishment. “But surely you 
are coming with me, Maud ? ” he exclaimed. 

“ I really don’t know whether it be the right thing to go 
traveling in winter with Edith, and I shall certainly not go 
without her.” 

Allan looked straight before him meditatively. 

“ I confess I hadn’t thought of that,” he confessed. “ But 
I can’t help thinking that it will be all right.” 

Maud made no reply. She was biding her time. Allan 
should not be let off so easily on this occasion. After a 
pause he went on, “The steamer is like a hotel, Maud. I 
shall take a suite, so as to have everything comfortable.” 

35 


THE TUNNEL 


Maud knew Mac through and through. He would not 
insist further. He would not say another word on the subject, 
nor would he take it ill if she decided not to accompany him. 

She could see that he was already endeavoring to reconcile 
himself to the thought that this might happen. 

He looked out straight in front moodily. It never occurred 
to him that she could be acting a part. He himself had 
never acted a part in his life, and his entire nature was simple 
and straightforward to a degree that was a constant source of 
astonishment to Maud. 

An impulse of tenderness moved her, and she seized his 
hand. Of course I^m coming with you, Mac ! she ex- 
claimed, with a loving expression on her face. 

Ah, that^s good,” he replied, squeezing her hand gratefully. 

Now that her ill-humor was banished, Maud felt happy 
and light-hearted, and began to talk in her liveliest manner. 

“ Was Ethel Lloyd very charming to you, Mac? ” she asked. 

‘‘Well, really, she was extremely civil,” he replied. 

“How does she strike you?” 

“ She seemed to me very simple and natural and unaffected 
f — almost like a child.” 

“ Oh ! ” Maud laughed, and she could not explain to herself 
why Mac’s answer made her vexed with him again. “ Oh, 
Mac, how well you know women! Good Heavens! Ethel 
Lloyd simple and natural ! Oh, la, la ! ” 

Allan was obliged to laugh too, but he insisted: “Well, 
she seemed simple and natural to me.” 

“ I never heard anything so absurd in all my life ! ” went 
on Maud. “How like a man! Why, there isn’t a more 
sophisticated being in the whole world than Ethel Lloyd. 
Her naturalness is all art. She is the most accomplished 
coquette, and everything about her is carefully planned out. 
She enjoys fascinating your sex. Take this from me, Mac. 
I know her. Didn’t you even notice her sphinx-like eyes ? ” 

“ No,” Mac replied, with perfect truth. 

“You didn’t! Well, she herself said to Mabel Gordon, 
‘ I have sphinx-like eyes — everybody says so.’ And you 
think her simple and natural. Why, she is the vainest creature 


PEEPAKATION 


37 


imaginable. Her photograph appears in the newspapers at 
least once a week. She is advertising herself unceasingly, 
just like Hobby. She even turns her good works into adver- 
tisements.’^ 

Well, but she may have a good heart for all that,” pleaded 
Allan. 

Ethel Lloyd ! ” Maud laughed again. Then she suddenly 
looked Allan straight in the eyes, gripping tight the nickel 
handle of the motor as she did so. Is she really so very 
beautiful, Mac?” she asked. 

‘^She is certainly beautiful, but Heaven knows why she 
puts such a lot of powder on ! ” 

Maud’s face became grave. ^^ Have you lost your heart to 
her, Mac, like all the others?” 

Allan laughed and drew her to him. ^^You are a little 
donkey, Maud,” he cried, and pressed her face up against 
his cheek. 

Maud was now entirely herself again. How was it that 
every trifle had managed to annoy her all that day? What 
did Ethel Lloyd matter to her? 

She remained silent a while. Then she said quite sincerely : 

^‘Very likely Ethel has a good heart, after all; in fact, I 
believe she has.” 

She had no sooner uttered the words than she realized 
that she did not really believe in the goodness of Ethel Lloyd’s 
heart. Decidedly, nothing seemed to go right to-day. 

After supper, which they had served to them in a private 
sitting-room, Maud went straight to bed, while Allan remained 
writing letters. But Maud could not get off to sleep. She 
had been on the move all day, and was over-tired. The dry, 
hot atmosphere of the bedroom seemed to make her feverish. 
All the excitements of the day — ^the railroad journey, the 
concert, the crowded audience, Ethel Lloyd — ^kept coming 
back to her overtaxed brain. The music and the buzzing of 
voices were still in her ears. Outside in the streets motor-cars 
rushed past, blowing their horns. In the distance she could 
hear the trains. Just as at last she began to doze, a crack 
in the steam-heating apparatus awoke her. She could hear 


38 


THE TUNNEL 


the humming sound of the lift as it went up. Light still 
shone in through the chink of the door. 

Are you still writing, Mac ? ” she asked, scarcely opening 
her lips to speak. 

Go to sleep, dear,^^ Mac replied, but the tones of his voice 
rang so loud that she laughed in her feverish half-sleep. 

At last she really slept. But soon she awoke again with 
a start, and shivering with cold. Her mind was a prey to 
some strange, sudden trouble. What was it that had startled 
her? Her dream came back to her. She had dreamed that 
she was in Edith’s room, and whom did she see there ? Ethel 
Lloyd! There was Ethel Lloyd, in all her brilliant beauty, 
the diamonds on her forehead, busy putting Edith carefully 
to bed — just as though she were Edith’s mother ! . . . 

Allan sat on in the adjoining room, writing away. Sud- 
denly he heard the door creak, and in came Maud in her night- 
dress, half-asleep still, and dazed by the bright lights. 

Her hair glistened. She looked young and glowing with 
health like a girl, but her eyes blinked nervously. 

‘‘What’s the matter, Maud?” asked Allan. 

Maud laughed tremulously. “ Nothing,” she replied, “ only 
silly dreams.” She sat down and smoothed out her hair. 
“ Why don’t you come to bed and sleep, Mac ? ” 

“ These letters must go by to-morrow’s steamer,” he an- 
swered. “You will catch cold, darling.” 

Maud shook her head. “ Oh, no ! It’s very hot here,” 
she cried. Then, fixing her eyes, now wide awake, on her 
husband, she went on, “ Mac, why don’t you tell me what 
it is you are doing with Lloyd. Why are you keeping it a 
secret from me?” 

Allan laughed and replied, speaking slowly, “Why, you 
never asked me about it, Maud. As a matter of fact, I did 
not want to talk about it as long as it was merely in the air.” 

“Well, won’t you tell me now?” 

“ Certainly I will.” 

And he proceeded to explain his scheme. Leaning back on 
the sofa, smiling good-humoredly, he set out the details of the 
great project quite simply, as though it were merely a quea- 


PEEPARATION 


39 


tion of a bridge over the East Eiver. Maud sat beside him in 
her night-dress, speechless with wonder and bewilderment. 
The more she began to understand, the more her wonder grew 
and the wider her shining eyes. Her head became feverishly 
hot. How at last she was able to realize the meaning of 
Allan’s doings during the last few years, his experiments and 
models, and piles of plans. How she grasped why he must 
start off from Hew York at once — ^there wasn^t a minute to 
spare. And why the letters must be dispatched by to-mor- 
row’s boat. It was all so marvelous that she asked herself 
whether she was still dreaming . . . 

When Allan had finished, she continued to sit silent, her 
wide-open eyes all amazement. “And so now you know, 
little Maud,” he added smilingly, and bade her go off to bed. 
Maud put her arms round him and pressed him to her breast 
with all her strength. Then, kissing him on the lips, she 
said, “ Mac, oh, my Mac ! ” 

On Allan’s bidding her once more to go to bed, and to 
sleep, she left him. The thought came to her now that 
Allan’s projected work was in its way — its very different way 
— as great as the symphony to which she had listened that 
evening. 

To Allan’s astonishment she returned after a few minutes. 
She had brought a wrap, and whispering to him, “ Work on ! 
Work on ! ” she lay down on the sofa, resting her head against 
him, and fell asleep. 

Allan paused and looked down at her. And he thought 
how beautiful and touching she looked, this little Maud of 
his, and how willingly he would give his life a thousand times 
over for her. 

Then he set to work again. 


V 


HAED AT WOEK 

On the following Wednesday Allan and Maud started for 
Europe on the German boat. Hobby accompanied them, 
making an eight-day return trip of it. 

Maud was in wonderful spirits. She had recaptured her 
happiest mood — the mood of her girlhood — and it lasted all 
the way across the wintry and inclement ocean, although she 
saw Mac only at meal-times and in the evening. Laughing 
and talking merrily, she paced up and down the arctic-cold 
deck corridors in her thin patent-leather shoes and her fur coat. 

Hobby was the most popular man on the boat. He was at 
home everywhere, from the cabins of the doctor and the 
paymaster to the sacred precincts of the captain^s bridge. 
Erom early morning until last thing at night, there was no 
corner of the ship where his clear, somewhat nasal utterance 
was not audible. 

Allan, on the other hand, was neither to be heard nor seen. 
He was busy all day long. Two typists were kept hard at 
work all day dealing with his letters. Hundreds of letters 
lay heaped up in his state-room, addressed and ready for 
dispatch on arrival. All his preparations were being made 
for his opening campaign. 

Paris was his first destination. Thence he would go to 
Calais and Folkestone, where the Channel Tunnel was in 
process of construction, England having cured herself of her 
ridiculous fears of an invasion, which, if attempted, could 
be defeated by a single battery. Here Allan stayed for three 
weeks. Then they moved on to London, Berlin, Essen, 
Leipzig, Frankfurt, and back once more to Paris. At each 
of these places they stayed some weeks. Allan spent the 
mornings at work alone. After the midday meal he had 
daily conferences with representatives of great firms, engineers, 

40 


HARD AT WORK 


41 


mechanicians, designers, geologists, geographical experts, 
oceanographers, statisticians, and members of the various 
faculties: an army of trained intellect from all parts of 
Europe — France, England, Grermany, Italy, Norway, Russia. 

In the evening he dined alone with Maud, unless he hap- 
pened to have guests. 

Maudes good-humor had not deserted her. The atmosphere 
of strenuous effort, in which Allan and she now lived, stim- 
ulated her. Three years before, shortly after their marriage, 
she had made exactly the same journey with Mac, and she 
had then found it difiScult to forgive him for giving most of 
his time to strange men and to business affairs of which she 
knew nothing. Now that she understood the meaning of all 
these conferences and all the hours devoted to work, things 
were quite different. 

She had plenty of time on her hands, but she arranged its 
distribution methodically. She allotted a part of the day to 
Edith; a part of it to visiting picture-galleries, museums, 
churches and other sights. On her previous trip she had not 
been able to do much in this way. Naturally Allan had 
accompanied her everywhere whenever she so wished, but she 
had soon come to feel that he was not much interested in 
all the beautiful pictures and sculptures, all the wonderful 
old tapestries and oh jets d'art. What he liked to see were 
the great factories and industrial establishments, technical 
museums, airships, machinery in every form, and all these 
things meant nothing to her. 

Now, on the other hand, she was free to look about her alone 
and at her own sweet will, and she was delighting in all the 
thousand exquisite things which made Europe so dear to her. 
She went to theaters and concerts whenever she felt inclined. 
She laid in a rich store of memories. She dallied in 
old streets and narrow alleys, bought books and prints of 
the paintings and statuary in the museums, and all kinds 
of views.” 

In Paris Allan left her alone for eight days. He had busi- 
ness to transact with surveyors and a lot of agents in the neigh- 
borhood of Nantes, hard by Les Sables on the coast of the 


42 


THE TUNNEL 


Bay of Biscay. After this they took ship, with several of 
the surveyors and agents and some engineers, for the Azores, 
where Allan busied himself for three weeks on the Fayal 
San Jorge, and Pico Islands. From the Azores they went to 
Bermuda, right across the Atlantic, on a cargo steamer, being 
the only passengers on board — a fact which was a source 
of great joy to Maud. Here, in Hamilton, to their delight 
they encountered Hobby, who had made the trip to Bermuda 
specially to meet them. In June, the business in Bermuda 
having been got through speedily, they were back in America. 
Allan rented a country house in Westchester County, and the 
same kind of activities kept him busy here as had absorbed 
him in London, Paris, and Berlin. It was a case of endless 
discussions with engineers, agents, experts of all kinds from 
all parts of the States. As long conferences with Lloyd now 
became frequent, the newspapers began to take notice of his 
proceedings. Eeporters went sniffing about like hyaenas that 
have scented carrion. Eumors of the extraordinary prepara- 
tions in hand were soon current in New York. 

But Allan and his trusty collaborators held their tongues, 
while Maud, who was besieged with questions, merely laughed 
and said nothing. 

By the end of August, the preliminary works were com- 
pleted. Lloyd sent out invitations to a conference to thirty 
men, representing all the great industries and banking houses 
in New York — invitations written in his own handwriting 
and consigned to special messengers so as to emphasize their 
importance. 

And on the 18th of September, this memorable conference 
took place in the Atlantic Hotel, Broadway. 


VI 


THE COHEEEElSrCE 

Hew York was experiencing a heat wave, so Allan decided 
to have the conference on the roof-garden of the hotel. 

The men who were taking part in it, most of whom lived 
out of New York, came in gigantic, dust-covered motor-cars, 
with their wives and sons and daughters, from their country 
places nearby. A few who were of solitary habits or morose 
temperaments came by trains-de-luxe from St. Louis, Chicago 
and Cincinnati. These had yachts moored in the Hudson. 
Three Chicago magnates, Kilgallan, Mullenbach and C. 
Morris, had come by the express air-ship which made the 
entire journey of eight hundred miles to New York in eight 
hours; while the famous sportsman, Vanderstyfft, had 
alighted from his monoplane during the morning on the roof- 
garden. 

A few had come quite unostentatiously like ordinary visitors 
on foot, grip in hand. 

But they all came. Lloyd had made them realize the 
terrific importance of the occasion, and that kinship which 
is inherent in common money-interest to a much greater degree 
than in blood-relationship forbade them to hold aloof. They 
came not merely because they scented ‘^good business” (in- 
deed it was possible that they might even be called upon 
to shell out”), but especially because they hoped to have 
a hand in a project the immensity of which appealed to that 
spirit of enterprise which had made them what they were. 
Lloyd had spoken of it as the biggest and most daring 
project in the world^s history.” That was enough to lure 
them out of their fastnesses, for the planning out of new enter- 
prises was to them the essence of existence. 

The coming together of so many magnates had naturally 
not passed without notice, for every single one of them lived in 
the glare of publicity, his every action observed and noted. 

43 


44 


THE TUNNEL 


Wall Street had experienced a slight feverishness during the 
morning. A trustworthy tip should mean the making of a 
fortune. The newspapers gave the names of all the men who 
had come to the conference, and did not forget to mention how 
much each of them was worth. By five o’clock in the after- 
noon it was a case of thousands of millions ! Whatever might 
be under discussion, it was certainly something gigantic. 
Some of the writers talked as though they had been just 
lunching with Lloyd, and were entirely in his confidence, but 
in point of fact Lloyd had told them precious little. Others 
went even further and recounted textually what they declared 
Lloyd had said to them. The matter was nothing so wonder- 
ful, they said: it was merely an extension of the mono-rail 
electric railway from Chicago on to San Francisco. Another 
version was that the network of regular airship-communication 
was to be extended so as to embrace the whole of the United 
States, instead of being confined, as at present, to leading 
towns like Buffalo, Chicago and St. Louis. A third announce- 
ment was that Hobby’s famous project for turning New York 
into an American Venice was now at last to be carried out. 

The reporters prowled round the hotel like police-dogs on 
the scent. Their heels sank into the melting asphalt of 
Broadway as they stood staring up at the six and thirty 
stories of the hotel, as though waiting for inspiration from 
its chalk-white walls. One resourceful individual hit on the 
happy expedient of smuggling himself into the hotel as a 
telephone official and thus penetrating into one of the million- 
aires’ private suites, where he actually tested the telephone 
on the off chance of coming in for a significant word. But 
the manager of the hotel finding him thus occupied informed 
him politely that all the telephones in the hotel were working 
properly. 

The great white tower of the hotel looked like a monument 
of silence in the midst of all the surrounding excitement. 

Evening came. The resourceful ex-telephone official who 
had been frustrated in his efforts of the afternoon had donned 
a beard and attempted to make his way up to the roof as 
one of Vanderstyfft’s, experts to attend to some detail in the 


THE CONFERENCE 


45 


aeroplane which called for attention, but the manager again 
interposed, explaining that Mr. Vanderstyilt's Marconi ap- 
paratus also was in no need of repairs! 

Upon this the resourceful one returned to the street and 
vanished, to think out some new maneuver. An hour later 
he returned in the guise of a globe-trotter in a motor-car, 
packed with luggage duly adorned with hotel labels, and 
asked for a room on the thirty-sixth floor. However, as the 
thirty-sixth floor was reserved for the servants, he had to be 
content with room No. 3512, which the manager offered him 
with much politeness. As soon as he was installed here, he 
suggested to a Chinese boy, on duty on the roof-garden, that 
he should hide somewhere among the plants an insignificant 
looking little apparatus no bigger than a kodak. 

But Allan had given explicit instructions and the manager 
had guaranteed that they should be carried out. 

As soon as all the members of the conference should have 
reached the roof-garden, the elevator was not to go higher 
than the thirty-fifth floor. The boys on duty were not to 
leave the roof-garden until the last member should have 
taken his departure. Only six representatives of the press 
and three photographers were allowed admission (Allan 
needed them as much as they needed him), and only on their 
word of honor not to communicate with the outside world 
during the conference. 

A few minutes before nine o’clock Allan appeared on the 
roof-garden to satisfy himself that all his arrangements had 
been attended to. He immediately detected the wireless- 
telegraphy apparatus which had been secreted in a laurel-bush 
and a quarter of an hour later, our resourceful friend received 
it back in room No. 3512, neatly tied up and sealed — not to 
his surprise, for his receiving apparatus had recorded for him 
the words, uttered with asperity : Take that thing away 1 ” 

At nine o’clock the lift became very active. 

The participants in the conference stepped out on to the 
roof-garden bathed in perspiration, for the interior of the 
hotel was like an oven in spite of the refrigerators. They 
felt as though they were passing from hell into purgatory. 


46 


THE TUlSnSTEL 


Each one as he stepped out of the lift seemed to recoil for a 
moment before this wall of heat. Then he divested himself 
of his coat. The ladies were Maud — ^looking very bright and 
well, dressed completely in white — and Mrs. Brown, a feeble- 
looldng little old woman with a yellow face and the distrustful 
expression of those who are at once miserly and deaf: the 
richest woman in the United States and a notorious usurer. 

Every one knew every one else without being introduced. 
They had all met on other financial battle-fields and had 
fought many fights either against each other or shoulder to 
shoulder. They respected each other — on this side idolatry. 
Nearly all were either gray haired or white — quiet, worthy, 
prudent, sensible folk, and most of them had friendly, good- 
humored, almost childlike eyes. They stood about in groups, 
chatting and joking, or else walked up and down in twos 
conversing, in imdertones. The few who seemed silent or 
morose sat apart on the arm chairs which had been provided, 
gazing out in front of them somewhat forbiddingly, or else 
concentrating their eyes upon the Persian carpet spread over 
the roof. From time to time one or other of them would 
look at his watch and then at the door of the lift: there 
were still some stragglers to arrive. 

Down below New York was bubbling over with excitement, 
all the greater for the heat. The city weltered in perspiration 
like a prize-fighter after a dozen rounds. It puffed like a 
steam engine after a long distance run. The motor-cars, 
almost sticking in the melted asphalt, buzzed and snorted 
up and down Broadway, the endless string of electric-cars 
whirred this way and that to the accompaniment of their 
warning bells; a more piercing sound rang out far away — 
the alarm-bell of a fire-engine dashing down a street. Bells 
seemed to be ringing everywhere, mingled with cries in the 
distance as though from some dreadful scene of slaughter. 

All around one saw rows and clusters of sparkling lights. 
In the deep blue of the sultry evening, one could not say at 
first glance whether they belonged to earth or heaven. 

Broadway itself stood out clearly in all its immense length 
like an endless, white-hot oven along which colored lights 


THE CONFERENCE 


47 


whirled and little heaps of ashes moved hither and thither — 
masses of minute specks — men! A side street hard by 
gleamed like a river of molten lead. Silvery clouds of smoke 
went up from cross streets further away. In one direction 
isolated ‘‘sky-scrapers^’ towered aloft, ghostly white. In 
another, great masses of dark and somber tower-capped build- 
ings rose to still greater altitudes, looming up like monstrous 
tombstones above the twelve- and fifteen-storied erections 
of a previous decade. In the far distance, high up, a dozen 
rows of faintly gleaming window panes told of a house of so 
many stories, not another vestige of which could be made 
out. Here and there forty-storied towers, with lights dimly 
burning; the roof-gardens of the St. Regis, the Metropolitan, 
the Waldorf-Astoria, and the Republic. On the horizon 
gleamed the lights of Hoboken, Jersey City, Brooklyn, 
East New York. In the space between two great skyscrapers 
there flashed every minute a dual jet of light, like a stream 
of electric sparks — the elevated railroad of Sixth Avenue. 

All round the hotel twinkled the manifold illuminations of 
advertisers. Ceaseless flashes and streams of light lit up 
the streets and shot across the sky. A spark of lightning, 
as it were, touched a lofty tower-house, and the outlines of an 
enormous boot blazed out. An entire house lit up suddenly, 
and its lights resolved into the representation of a red bull — 
“ BuU Durham Tobacco.” Rockets raced up into the heavens 
and exploded into advertising symbols. A violet-hued sun 
sailed inconsequently over Manhattan and sent forth jets 
of fire. Cones of rays from fireworks of all kinds fell in 
spreading clusters in all directions. The moon and the stars 
paled their ineffectual fires up aloft. 

From the Battery came buzzing an advertising air-ship, 
constructed in the semblance of an owl with two large round 
eyes. On its belly the words flashed out in electric light, 
alternately : Health I — Success — Suggestion — ^Wealth — 
14 Pine Street. 

Down below, six and thirty stories down, could be seen 
a dense mob swaying hither and thither — reporters, agents, 
brokers, idlers — all agog with excitement and suspense, their 


48 


THE TUNNEL 


eyes continually directed towards the roof-garden, with its 
garlands of light. The cries of the Broadway newspaper 
boys — Extra! Extra I — ^rose shrilly above the unceasing 
murmur of the crowd. The World had just achieved its 
greatest scoop,’^ by which it had thrown all the other papers 
into the shade. It was in a position to assert that the proj- 
ect in process of being launched by the millionaires was a sub- 
marine postal service — the America-Europe Lightning Mail — 
A.E.L.M. Just as letters were now dispatched by air-pres- 
sure in underground tubes from New York to San Fran- 
cisco, so they were to be sent to Europe under the Atlantic 
through tubes of greater strength, laid down like cables, via 
Bermuda and the Azores. A matter of three hours from 
the New World to the Old! 

Even the calmest of the great financiers on the roof-garden 
was unable to remain entirely impassive to the prevailing 
excitement, and it was a relief to every one when Hobby 
opened the proceedings. 

Flourishing a telegram in his hand, he announced that Mr. 
C. H. Lloyd wished to express his regret that he was himself 
prevented by illness from being present to welcome them, but 
that he had requested him (Hobby) to introduce to them Mr. 
Mac Allan, for long on the staff of the Edison Works, and the 
inventor of the ^^Allanite” diamond-stone. 

^^Here he is!^^ said Hobby, pointing to Allan, who with 
Maud beside him sat in a wicker-work arm-chair in his shirt 
sleeves like the rest. 

Mr. Allan, he went on, had something to say to them. He 
would submit to them the project which Mr. Lloyd himself 
had characterized as the biggest and most daring in the history 
of the world. Mr. Allan possessed the genius necessary to its 
carrying out, but in order to carry it out he needed money. 
And then, turning to his friend, he said: ‘^Now then, 
Mac!^^ 

Allan stood up. 

But Hobby made him a sign to wait a moment, and, giving 
another glance at the telegram, continued, I ought to have 
added that, in the event of the scheme winning the support of 


THE CONFERENCE 


49 


the meeting, Mr. Lloyd will contribute twenty-five million 
dollars . . . Now, Mac, my boy!^^ 

Allan took Hobby’s place. The silence was oppressive. 
The streets down below buzzed unceasingly. All eyes were 
turned towards the speaker. So this was the man who had 
the extraordinary proposal to put before them. Maud’s lips 
were wide apart from suspense and anxiety. Allan allowed 
his gaze to wander round his audience quietly, and no one 
could have guessed from his outward demeanor how nervous 
he felt. It would be no easy matter to face such a group 
of listeners, and he was better at anything than at speaking. 
It was indeed the first time he had ever addressed a large 
and important gathering. But his voice rang out clear and 
strong when he began. 

He started off by declaring that he was afraid, in view of 
the kind things Mr. Lloyd had said about his scheme, that 
they might be disappointed by what he had to put before 
them. His project did not deserve to be called a bigger thing 
than the Panama Canal or Sir William Rogers’ Park Street 
Bridge, connecting India and Ceylon. In fact, it was really 
a simple project enough. 

At this point he took a piece of chalk out of one of the 
pockets of his white trousers and drew two lines on a black- 
board, standing just behind him. Here was America and here 
was Europe. He undertook within a period of fifteen years 
to construct a submarine tunnel between the two continents, 
through which trains could run from the one to the other in 
twenty-four hours. That was his scheme. 

The photographers chose this moment for their first flash- 
light snapshots, and Allan had to pause for a few seconds 
before continuing. Exclamations came up from the streets — 
the crowds had realized that the battle had begun. 

It seemed at first as though Allan’s epoch-making proposal 
— sensational enough even in our go-ahead era — had not 
impressed his hearers in the slightest degree. Many of them 
were undoubtedly disappointed. This was no new idea to 
them — they had often heard it sketched out before. It was 
‘^in the air” like so many projects — and it was one which 


50 


THE TUNNEL' 


had never been put forward without evoking derision. Among 
these financiers there were some who earned more money 
while winding their watch than most men could earn in a 
month, men who would not move a muscle if the earth were 
to explode suddenly like a bomb, but there was not one of 
them who was disposed to have an hour of his time wasted. 
This had been their own fear in coming, for, after all, even 
Lloyd sometimes got on a wrong track. It was possible that 
this young fellow might have got on to some old chimera — 
a scheme perhaps for irrigating the Sahara and turning it 
into fruit-farms. This tunnel idea wasnT as bad as that. 
Even the silent and morose individuals breathed a sigh of 
relief. 

Allan, for his part, had not expected to take his listeners 
captive in a sentence, and he was not at all dissatisfied with 
the effect produced by his announcement. He might have 
paved the way for it, but he had thought it better to sling 
it at them as though from a catapult. This seemed the best 
way to attack the inevitable phlegm of such an audience. 
It was essential that he should arrest their attention. And 
after all, despite their impassive countenances, he felt that he 
had succeeded. The arm-chairs creaked. Some of the men 
leaned forward, one or two of them lit fresh cigars. Mrs. 
Brown sat grasping her ear-trumpet. Mittersteiner, of the 
New York Central Bank, whispered something into the ear 
of J. D. Morse, the Copper Mng.” 

And Allan proceeded, with increased courage and self- 
confidence. 

The tunnel would have its entrance on the coast of New 
Jersey, some seventy miles south of New York; it would touch 
Bermuda and the Azores and the North of Spain, and end 
in France on the Biscayan coast. Both Bermuda and the 
Azores were necessary as oceanic stations from a technical 
point of view; with the one American and two European 
openings, they gave in all five starting points for the con- 
struction of the Tunnel. They were of the utmost importance 
also from the point of view of the profits. Bermuda would 
absorb all the passenger-traffic and the postal service from 


THE CONFERENCE 


51 


Mexico, the West Indies, Central America and the Panama 
Canal, while the Azores would have all that from South 
America and Africa. These two oceanic stations would be- 
come as important centers of the world’s traffic as London and 
New York. As for the American and European stations, it 
was needless to indicate the roles they must inevitably play 
in the evolution of the world. The different governments 
would be obliged to give their sanction to the building of the 
tunnel — he himself would force them to submit the scheme in 
its details to their respective Bourses. Otherwise they would 
be injuring their commerce to the extent of thousands of 
millions of dollars. 

The Behring Straits Tunnel which was taken in hand 
three years ago,” he went on, ^Hhe Calais-Dover Tunnel, 
which reaches its completion this year, have both served to 
prove that the construction of submarine tunnels presents 
no insuperable obstacles to modern engineering. The Calais- 
Dover Tunnel is about thirty miles in length. Mine in round 
numbers will be about three thousand. What I have to do 
is to carry out on a hundred times bigger scale what the 
English and French engineers have already achieved. I don’t 
underestimate the difficulties but it isn’t necessary for me to 
remind you that the modern engineer is able to work steadily 
and comfortably wherever he can install his apparatus. Finan- 
cially, my scheme depends upon your effort. I do not want 
your money — as Hobby said — for I can build the tunnel 
with American and European gold, with the gold of the whole 
world. The practicability of the scheme — the practicability of 
constructing such a tunnel within a period of fifteen years — is 
due to my own invention of the hard-steel known as Allan- 
ite,” the substance which comes nearest to diamonds in hard- 
ness. This Allanite ” enables us to pierce the hardest sub- 
stances and enables us to use the greatest possible number of 
borers at the lowest possible cost.” 

His listeners sat attentive. He was making progress with 
them. Most of them were looking down on the ground, two 
or three only gazed upwards at the stars, their cheeks wet 
with perspiration. One man took a cigar from between his 


52 


THE THHHEE 


lips and looked fixedly at Allan; another rested his chin 
on his hand and nodded meditatively. The good-humored, 
almost childlike, look had disappeared from all eyes and had 
given place to an expression of caution and calculation. Mrs. 
Brown hung on Allan’s lips, and her mouth took on an aspect 
of sharpness, almost of bitterness and scorn. All the thirty 
slave-driving big brains into which Allan had been hammering 
his ideas and arguments were working for all they were worth. 
This proposal of Allan’s was, indeed, no everyday affair. It 
needed and deserved consideration. It was no question of a 
couple of million of bushels of wheat or bales of wool, no mere 
matter of a few thousand shares in a diamond mine. A 
great deal more was here at stake. For some of them this 
project of Allan’s meant a big pile of gold without much risk, 
for others a good deal of risk was involved. But they had 
to reflect upon the question of prestige. For they could not 
leave Lloyd out of account — Lloyd the all-powerful who 
stalked through the world, creating and destroying. Lloyd 
knew what he was about and this fellow Allan was evidently 
going ahead. During the last few weeks there had been 
big transactions on Wall Street in Montanas and in industrial 
securities. How they knew that Lloyd had been at the back 
of all this, while putting forward some of his men of straw. 
It was manifest that this Lloyd, who was sitting quietly in his 
counting house smoking his cigars, had been unloading for 
weeks past specially for this occasion. He was always in first, 
had always pegged out the best claims before the rush came. 
But in this case it was not too late to get nearly even with him. 
They had only to get their cables off to all parts of the world 
that evening after the conference. To-morrow morning they 
might all be too late. 

Yes, they had to think of prestige. 

Some of them sought to solve the problem for themselves 
by subjecting Allan’s personality to a microscopic analysis. 
While they had been listening to his address and noting all he 
had to say about the construction of the Tunnel and the 
technical difficulties involved therein, they had scrutinized) 
him from his patent leather shoes upwards, his snow-white 


THE CONFERENCE 


53 


flannel trousers, his belt, his shirt, his collar and his tie, to 
his massive brow, and the large crown of his head well covered 
with copper-red hair. The man’s face, all wet with perspira- 
tion, glistened like bronze, but in spite of his hour’s talking it 
showed no sign of fatigue. On the contrary, it was full of 
vigor and alertness. His eyes looked out boldly, as hard 
and strong as the Allanite ” which had made him famous. 
One felt that if this man wanted to eat nuts he could dispense 
with the crackers. His voice had rung out clear and resonant. 
The strong brown arm (tattooed with two crossed hammers) 
which they had watched as he drew the chalk lines on the 
black-board was the arm of an athlete and a boxer. They had 
indeed studied their man much as a boxer is studied by those 
who think of backing him. He was a good specimen — there 
was no doubt about it. One could lose on him without being 
ashamed of it. And then he was Lloyd’s selection. They 
knew, too, that for twelve years he had worked as a youth in 
a coal mine and they reflected that in the intervening twenty 
years he had worked himself up to a good height — from one 
thousand yards underground in that mine up to the roof- 
garden. These were good credentials. The mere planning 
out of the great enterprise was a big achievement in itself, 
and the biggest achievement of all had been the getting of 
them altogether — the whole thirty of them — at a given hour 
and forcing them to sit there listening to him in a temperature 
of ninety in the shade. They seemed to see the strange thing 
happening before their eyes — each one of them in turn deciding 
to take his share in the venture. 

Allan was speaking : I shall need water-power equal to that 
of all the Niagara Power Works put together. Niagara is no 
longer available so I shall have to create my own Niagara.” 

They awoke from their musing, and sat looking at him. 

They noticed one other remarkable thing about this man. 
Throughout the whole of his address he had neither laughed 
nor perpetrated a joke. Humor did not seem to be one of 
his characteristics. The assembled company had had only 
one laugh all the time. That was when the photographers 
had engaged in a heated squabble among themselves and Allan 


54 


THE TUNNEL 


had called out to them in his masterful way — Stop your 
nonsense.” 

Allan ended up by reading tributes from the leading experts 
from all parts of the world — engineers, geologists, oceano- 
graphers, and statisticians. 

What evoked the keenest interest of all was Lloyd’s resume 
of the expenses involved and the profits to be expected. Allan 
concluded with this, and the thirty brains set to work checking 
the figures with the utmost speed and precision. 

The heat, meanwhile, seemed to have increased threefold. 
They were all bathed in perspiration, and great beads of sweat 
ran down their faces. Even the refrigerators, hidden behind 
the plants and shrubs, seemed to afford no relief. They 
might have been in the tropics. J apanese boys, dressed in cool 
snow-white linen, moved noiselessly in and out with glasses 
of lemonade, horse’s-neck, gin-fizz and ice-water. But nothing 
was of any use. The heat rose in waves from the streets 
below — visible waves of vapor, which one could almost grip 
with the hands. New York, all asphalt and concrete, was like 
a monstrous accumulator which had taken in all the heat of 
the last week, and was now giving it out again. Broadway 
continued to hum and buzz along its whole length. It seemed 
almost as though the brain of New York herself, that symbol 
of frenzied energy and high ambition, was hot and feverish 
with the conception of some new, tremendous, epoch-making 
idea. 

Allan stopped speaking quite suddenly, scarcely rounding 
off his final sentence. He had prepared no peroration. It had 
been an unconventional address, with its climax at the begin- 
ning. Its end came so unexpectedly that none moved for a 
while, and all ears were still on the alert when he took his 
abrupt departure, leaving his scheme for discussion by his 
listeners. 

The advertising airship sailed over the roof-garden, bearing 
its glad tidings to Manhattan : Twenty-five years in- 
crease OF life! — Guaranteed! — Dr. Josty, Brooklyn.” 


VII 


TKIUMPH 

Allan went down with Hand to their suite on the tenth floor 
to dine. He was so drenched with perspiration that he had 
to change everything. Even then the sweat broke out in 
beads again on his forehead. His eyes looked sightless from 
the great strain. 

Maud dried his forehead and cooled his ears with a towel 
dipped in ice-water. 

Maud was radiant. She chattered and laughed excitedly. 
What an evening it had been! The wonderful gathering of 
notabilities, the roof-garden, the garlands of lights, the magic 
of the panorama all around — never would she forget all these 
things. How strange they had looked sitting up there in a 
circle — all those famous names which had been familiar to 
her from her earliest youth, and which in themselves made an 
atmosphere of wealth and power and brilliance and scandal. 
There they had all sat listening to her Mac ! She was inde- 
scribably proud of Mac. His triumph intoxicated her. Hot 
for a moment did she doubt his ultimate success. 

Oh, how nervous I was, Mac ! she cried, giving him a 
hug. ^^And how wonderfully you spoke! I couldn’t believe 
my ears. You wonderful Mac!” 

Allan laughed. Well, I’d rather have talked to a meeting 
of devils than to those fellows, I can tell you that, Maud.” 
How long will they be, do you think ? ” 

Perhaps an hour or two, but they might take all night ! ” 
All night!” 

They might. Anyway, they will give us time to eat our 
dinner in comfort.” 

By now Allan was recovering his equilibrium. His hands 
no longer trembled, and his eyes had got back their normal 
gaze. He performed his duties as an attentive husband, serv- 
ing Maud with the most appetizing and tempting dishes, and 

65 


56 


THE TUNNEL 


gradually calming down while so engaged, though the per- 
spiration still coursed down his cheeks. He discovered that 
he was extraordinarily hungry. Maud, on the other hand, 
talked so much that she scarcely ate anything. She reviewed 
the entire company. She thought that Mittersteiner had a 
most notable and striking head. She commented on the ex- 
traordinarily youthful aspect of Kilgallan, and she said that 
John Andrus, the mining magnate, looked like a hippopot- 
amus ; C. B. Smith, the banker, on the other hand, reminded 
her of a little, sly, gray fox. As for Mrs. Brown, Maud com- 
plained that the old witch had treated her like a schoolgirl. 
Was it true that Mrs. Brown, out of sheer miserliness, would 
not have any light in her house? 

While they were still at dinner Hobby made his appearance. 

Maud jumped up, all excitement. How do things 
stand she asked. 

Hobby laughed, and threw himself into an armchair. 

never saw anything like it,’^ he exclaimed. ‘‘They 
are at it hammer and tongs! You would think it was Wall 
Street. C. B. Smith wanted to clear out of it, but no I they 
wouldn’t let him. He declared he must be oft, that the 
thing was too venturesome for him, and he made for the lift. 
But they were all after him, and simply dragged him out of 
the lift by the coat-tails. No lie, really! You should see 
Kilgallan in the middle of them all, overflowing with enthu- 
siasm and calling out all the time, ‘ You can’t pick holes in 
it ! You can’t find anything wrong with it ! ’ ” 

“Well, Kilgallan would approve, naturally,” said Allan. 
“ He could have nothing against it.” Kilgallan was the head ' 
of the Steel Trust. 

“ And Mrs. Brown ! It’s a blessing the photographers are 
there! She looks like a scarecrow in an ecstasy. She has 
gone stark staring mad, Mac ! She almost scratched the eyes 
out of Andrus. She is beside herself, and keeps screaming 
out, ‘ Allan is the greatest man who ever lived ! It would be 
a disgrace to America if his scheme were not carried out.’ ” 

“ Mrs. Brown ? ” Maud was astounded. “ Why, she won’t 
have a light in her house out of sheer miserliness ! ” 


TKIUMPH 


57 


In spite of that, Maud ! ” replied Hobby, laughing again, 

she and Kilgallan between them will pull Mac through.” 

“ Won’t you have some dinner with us ? ” Allan asked. 

Yes, do. Hobby,” Maud chimed in. 

But Hobby could not wait. He was much more excited 
now than Allan, although the whole thing was of no impor- 
tance to him personally. He rushed away. 

He returned to report progress every quarter of an hour. 

‘‘Mrs. Brown has booked herself for ten million dollars, 
Mac ! Things are beginning now ! ” 

“ Good Heavens ! ” exclaimed Maud, still incredulous, and 
she clapped her hands together in her excitement. 

Allan peeled a pear and glanced quickly at Hobby. 
“ Well ? ” he said. “ Tell us more.” 

Hobby was too excited to sit down. Walking up and down 
the room, he took out a cigar from his case and bit off the 
end. “ She takes out a pocket-book,” he said, lighting his 
cigar, “such a pocket-book! You never saw anything so 
dirty. I wouldn’t have touched it with the tongs 1 And she 
writes something in it. Dead silence 1 How the others fum- 
ble in their pockets, and presently Kilgallan goes round and 
collects the various bits of paper — the photographers working 
at high pressure. Mac, your affair is through, or I’ll eat my 
hat!” 

Then Hobby disappeared for a longer time. A whole hour 
passed. 

Maud had grown very quiet. She sat quite still, listening 
anxiously for the sound of a footstep. The longer she waited 
the more nervous she grew. Allan sat in an armchair, medi- 
tatively smoking his pipe. 

At last Maud could contain herself no longer, and she 
asked rather dejectedly, “And supposing they can’t agree, 
Mac?” 

Allan took the pipe out of his mouth, raised his eyes, and, 
with a smile, answered calmly in his deep voice, “ Well, then 
we shall go back to Buffalo and I shall go on making Allanite.” 
But, with a confident nod of his head, he went on, “They 
mil agree all right, Maud ! ” 


58 


THE TUE^NEL 


At this moment the telephone-bell rang. It was Hobby. 

Come np at once ! 

As Allan stepped out on to the roof -garden again, Kilgallan 
came towards him and clapped him on the shoulder. 

You are all right, Mac ! he said. 

Quietly Mac handed a sheaf of telegrams to a red-coated 
servant. 

Some minutes later the roof-garden was deserted. Every 
one had gone about his own business. The hotel servants 
were moving away the chairs and plants to make room for 
Vanderstyfft^s great aeroplane. 

Yanderstyfft took his seat in it and saw to the lamps. The 
propeller throbbed, the machine leapt forward a dozen paces 
and rose in the air, then vanished like a great white bird in 
the luminous clouds of Hew York. 


VIII 


THE WORLD IS STIRRED 

Ten minutes after the conference was over the telegraph was 
in full play with Hew Jersey, France, Spain, Bermuda, and 
the Azores. An hour later Allan’s agents had bought up land 
to the- extent of twenty-five million dollars. 

The land in question was of course at the points most 
favorable for the openings of the Tunnel ; Allan had chosen 
the spots years before. For the most part it was land of the 
poorest and cheapest kind — marsh-land, sand-dunes, morasses, 
ridges, barren islands. Considering the immense aggregate 
extent of the land — amounting to the territory of a Dukedom 
— the price was not large. A deep and extensive complex ” 
in Hoboken, with a front of two hundred and fifty yards along 
the Hudson, was also secured. All the districts were at a 
distance from large towns, for Allan had no use for towns. 
The marsh-land and sand-dunes would serve all right as 
building ground for the new cities which would be called into 
existence. 

While America still slept, Allan’s cablegrams flew all over 
the world, agitating the money markets of every nation. 
And in the morning every city in the world was thrilled by the 
announcement of the Atlantic Tunnel Syndicate. 

There had been wild excitement in the newspaper offices all 
night. Their rotary presses were doing double work. Many 
additional millions of the daily papers were sold next morning. 
Men pushed and struggled for the still damp sheets all over 
the city from the Battery to Two Hundredth Street — in ele- 
vators, on moving platforms, on the stairways to the stations, 
in the subways, everywhere. Hew streams of new editions 
kept gushing out all the morning. 

The news beat all records ! 

Mac Allan! — ^Who was he? What had he done? This 
man whose name had been brought so sensationally before the 

69 


60 


THE TUNNEL 


eyes of millions who had never heard it before — ^this man 
who had thrown New York right ont of its stride. 

Every one turned eagerly to the printed opinions of the 
various celebrities who had expressed themselves on the sub- 
ject of the Tunnel. 

C. H. Lloyd; Europe will become an extension of 
America.^’ 

H. E. Herbst, the tobacco magnate; You will be able to 
send a freight-car from New Orleans to Petrograd without 
unloading.^^ 

H. F. Bell, the multi-millionaire ; I shall be able to visit 
my married daughter in Paris every month instead of only 
three times a year.’’ 

De la Forest, Secretary of Commerce and Labor ; The 
Tunnel will mean the saving of one whole year of life to every 
business man.” 

There was an insistent demand for details of the scheme. 
In front of the newspaper offices such crowds collected that 
the drivers of the electric cars had to ring for minutes together 
before they could clear the route. For hours the compact 
masses of humanity stood and stared up at the Herald build- 
ing, although for several hours the same photographs were 
thrown over and over again upon the screen; Mac Allan, 
Hobby, and the company on the roof-garden. 

Seven thousand million subscribed,” Mac Allan expounds 
his scheme” (moving-picture), ‘‘Mrs. Brown puts her name 
down for ten millions” (moving-picture), C. H. Smith 
dragged back out of the elevator.” 

‘^We alone are able to show Vanderstyfft’s arrival on the 
roof-garden.” Moving-picture views; New York’s white, 
many-windowed sky-scrapers; white clouds of steam; a white 
butterfly; a white sea-gull; Vanderstyfft’s monoplane — cir- 
cling round and swerving down on the roof-garden; portrait 
of Mr. C. 0. Spinnaway knocked down by the monoplane and 
seriously hurt. New picture — Mac Allan says good-by to his 
wife and child and goes to his office.” 

And the series begins again. 

Suddenly, about eleven o’clock, it stops. Something new? 


THE WORLD IS STIRRED 


61 


All eyes are suddenly alert. A new portrait: Mr. Hunter, 
Broker, 15 Broad Street, has booked his seat for the first 
train from New York to Europe. 

The crowd laughs and cheers, with waving of hats. 

The telephone clerks were being worked to death. The 
telegraph and cable offices could not cope with the sudden 
rush of business. Every one made haste to discuss the situa- 
tion over the ’phone with partners, associates, clients. All 
Manhattan was in a fever. Cigar in mouth, hat on back of 
head, coat and waistcoat off, perspiration rolling down cheeks 
and neck, every business man was shouting and gesticulating. 
Bankers, brokers, agents, clerks — all were busy working out 
figures, calculating chances. They must ‘^come in,” they 
must be in the running, and on the best terms to be managed. 
A tremendous struggle was ahead of them — a financial Arma- 
geddon. It would be a case of ‘Hhe Devil take the hind- 
most ! ” 

Who were financing the enterprise ? How would it succeed ? 
Lloyd? Who said Lloyd was in it? Rittersheimer ? Who 
was this fellow Mac Allan, anyway, who had bought twenty- 
five million dollars’ worth of land over night — ^land which was 
soon to be worth three times, five times, perhaps a hundred 
times as much? 

The most excited people of all were to be found in the hand- 
some offices of the Great Atlantic steamship companies. Mac 
Allan had dealt a death-blow at steamship traffic. The mo- 
ment the Tunnel was ready — and it really looked now as 
though it would be ready one day — ^they might as well scrap 
all their hundreds of thousand tons of shipping. Passengers 
might still be got, perhaps, for their best, and biggest and 
most luxuriously fitted liners, at prices reduced by half; but 
their smaller vessels could only be turned to account as 
floating sanatoria for consumptives, or else be sold to the 
negroes of West Africa. Within two hours an Anti-Tunnel 
Trust had telephoned and telegraphed itself into existence, 
and had entered into communication with the various gov- 
ernments of the world. 

Erom New York the excitement spread like a conflagration 


62 


THE TUNNEL 


to Chicago, Buffalo, Pittsburg, St. Louis, San Francisco. 
London, Paris and Berlin simultaneously caught the fever. 

Huge placards with the announcement, A Hundred 
Thousand Workers,’^ gave New York a fresh sensation during 
the hottest hours of the day. 

Later the locality of the offices of the syndicate was made 
known — in Broadway. Here stood a brilliantly-white tower- 
building, thirty-two stories high, still in the hands of the 
workmen. 

Within half an hour of the appearance of the placard, the 
entire army of unemployed, numbering just then about 50,- 
000, began making their way from every corner of the city 
towards the whitewashed palisades surrounding the granite 
steps up to this imposing building. In the rooms on the 
ground floor, in which ladders and buckets of paint still 
stood about, they found Allaffis agents awaiting them — cool, 
experienced men with the quick eye of the slave-driver, that 
pierces through a man’s clothes and gauges the bones and 
muscles and sinews beneath. The shape of the shoulders, 
the outline of an arm, told them what they wanted to know. 
They detected dyed hair and any other efforts at fake ” or 
bluff. They discarded those who were too old or whom the 
murderous labor market of New York had already worn out. 
And although they dealt with hundreds of men in a few 
hours, woe to him who tried a second time ! All he got was a 
look which froze him to the marrow. He was not likely to 
try his luck again. 


IX 


THE WOKK BEGINS 

At all the five stations on the coasts of France and Spain, 
at Bermuda, at San Jorge (Azores), and at New Jersey, 
masses of laborers were making their appearance at the same 
instant. They arrived in carts and hired motor-trucks which 
rattled along over unfamiliar by-ways, lumbering up the sand- 
dunes, and sinking ankle-deep in swamps. At a certain 
chosen point, no different in nature from its surroundings, 
they clambered down from their seats, got out their surveying 
instruments and leveling apparatus, and set to work. They 
set to with a will, steadily, without fuss, just as though they 
were merely laying out a garden. They pegged out^^ a 
strip of land which lay at a carefully fixed angle with the 
line of the sea-coast, and stretched well inland, and soon 
they were all stationed at fix;ed points, each at his own special 
task. 

Now fresh trucks appeared, laden with beams, planks, 
slates, tiles, building materials of every description. It almost 
seemed as though these trucks had come along by chance and 
without any reference to the surveyors and engineers, who 
scarcely gave them a glance. They drew up. Beams and 
planks were tumbled out on the ground. Spades glittered 
under the blazing sun, hammers and saws began to work ; the 
air was filled with noise. 

Then arrived a handsome motor car, and a man got out 
and began shouting and gesticulating. He carried a bundle 
of leveling-poles under his arm, and made his way towards the 
surveyors. He was small and very light-haired. It was 
Hobby — in charge of the American station. 

Hullo ! he cried, laughing and wiping the beads of 
perspiration off his forehead. ‘^In another hour,” he went 
on, “we shall have a cook! Wilson cooks like a savage on 

63 


64 


THE TUNNEL 


Tom’s Eiver.” Then, sticking two fingers in his mouth, he 
gave out a shrill whistle. 

From the trucks there started four men with more of the 
flagged leveling-poles on their shoulders. 

“ Here, these gentlemen will show you chaps what to do.” 
And Hobby went off himself to the trucks, moving in and 
out among the planks and beams. 

Then he vanished in his motor to visit the workers at Lake- 
hurst, engaged on the construction of a temporary telephone 
line. He uttered some genial abuse, and then proceeded to 
the branch of the railroad, which ran past the land of the 
Syndicate. About halfway, a supply train, consisting of two 
locomotives and fifty cars, stopped in the middle of a meadow 
in which cattle were grazing. Behind was a passenger train 
with five hundred more workers. It was five o’clock. These 
five hundred workers had been taken on at two o’clock, and 
had left Hoboken at three. They were all in the best of 
spirits at having found work in the open air, and having been 
able to leave the stifling atmosphere of New York. 

They threw themselves on the fifty cars of the supply 
train and began unloading them. In a very short time the 
meadow was strewn with huge piles of planks, sheets of iron, 
slates, tiles, stoves, provisions, tents, boxes, sacks, and bundles 
of every description. Hobby was enjoying himself thoroughly. 
He shouted and whistled, and clambered upon the flat cars 
to give his orders. An hour later the camp kitchens were duly 
installed, and the cooks at work. Two hundred men were 
told off to fix up sleeping quarters for the night, while the 
remaining three hundred continued to unload. 

When it grew dark. Hobby ordered his boys ” to say their 
prayers and get to bed as comfortably as they could. He 
himself returned to the quarters of the engineers and sur- 
veyors and telephoned his report to New York. Afterwards he 
and the engineers went down to the sands for a bathe before 
turning in for the night. Though lying fully clothed on bare 
boards they fell asleep at once, and only awoke at daybreak. 

At four in the morning about a hundred more motor-trucks 
arrived with fresh material. Half an hour later a new de- 


THE WOEK BEGINS 


65 


tacliineiit of a thousand men made its appearance. They had 
slept in the train, and looked tired and hungry. The kitchens 
were now at their busiest, and the batteries also were working 
at high pressure. 

Hobby was up and about first thing. His work was a 
delight to him, and although he had not had many hours 
sleep he was in his usual condition of high spirits, and at once 
won the goodwill of his army of employees. He had pro- 
vided himself with a horse — a gray — and he galloped untir- 
ingly all over the place the whole day through. 

Along the railway line there were by this time great hillocks 
of materials. At eight o’clock a train of twenty fiat-cars 
steamed in, laden only with rails, sleepers, carts, and two neat 
little locomotives for a narrow-gauge railroad. At nine, an- 
other train arrived, bringing a new battalion of engineers. 
Hobby now turned a thousand men on to the construction of 
the small branch of the railroad which went to the building 
ground two miles away. In the evening came a train with 
two thousand iron camp-bedsteads with blankets. Hobby 
clamored over the telephone for more workers, and Allan 
promised him another supply of two thousand for the next 
day. 

Next morning they arrived in due course, and in their wake 
came endless trainloads of material. Hobby cursed! Allan 
was simply swamping him — ^he had not counted upon being 
taken so literally. But he determined to be equal to Allan’s 
thoroughgoing methods — typical as they were of modem 
America. 

On the third day the light railroad had reached the building 
ground, and by the evening one of the small locomotives 
steamed amid loud cheering into camp. She carried along 
endless car-loads of beams, planks, and sheet iron, and in 
a twinkling two thousand men were busying themselves stren- 
uously constructing barracks and camp-kitchens and sheds. 
Unfortunately, there was a heavy storm in the night, and 
Hobby’s city was shattered into pieces. 

The only relief for his feelings he could find was a long and 
hearty oath. He asked Allan for twenty-four hours’ grace. 


66 


THE TUNNEL 


but Allan took no notice, and kept sending on one train full 
of material after another, until Hobby went almost black in 
the face. 

About eleven o^clock that evening Allan himself turned up, 
and Maud with him. He hustled round, shouting out orders 
and admonishments, cursing and swearing generously, and 
making every one realize that the Syndicate was going to 
have its money^s worth in work and energy. Wherever he 
went he left behind him a wake of astonishment and respect. 

Hobby was not a man to be easily discouraged. He was 
determined that the fifteen years’ job should be caa*ried 
through within that specified period, and he was prepared 
to work till he dropped. A battalion of workers was con- 
structing a railroad embankment up to Lakewood. This was 
for ordinary trains. A rust-colored cloud of dust showed 
where they were engaged. Another gang was wrestling with 
the fresh supplies constantly arriving. A third had been 
turned on to making a great trench. A fourth was attend- 
ing to the carpentry work required in the barracks. 

Hobby, mounted on his gray horse, was ubiquitous. The 
workmen called him Jolly Hobby.” Allan they called. 

Mac.” Harriman, the chief engineer — a sturdily-built 
thick-set man, who had spent his whole life on such jobs 
all over the world — came to be known simply as ‘^Bull.” 

Three days after the first spade had been thrust into the 
ground, the spot had been transformed into a well-arranged 
field encampment. A week later it had developed into an 
extensive settlement, with extemporized barracks accommo- 
dating twenty thousand men, with slaughter-houses, dairies, 
bakeries, stores, canteens, a post and telegraph office, a 
hospital, and a cemetery. In addition to all this, there was a 
separate row of ready-made patent houses, which were 
molded in concrete on the spot and took only two days to 
fix up. The entire town was coated with dust, and looked 
quite white; the few patches of grass and the isolated bushes 
had become mere heaps of cement. 

Eight days later an enormous black engine, on immense 
red wheels, came puffing and snorting into the town, followed 


THE WORK BEGIlSrS 


67 


by an endless tow of cars. It stood blowing off steam, and 
sending np clouds of black smoke in the glaring sunlight. 
It was greeted with loud cheers. 

Next day there were several more of these engines, and in 
a week a regular army of them — ^great smoking demons they 
looked as they stood there, throbbing unceasingly, making 
the air pulsate with their exhalations. The whole place 
was enveloped in mist and smoke. The atmosphere was 
often so dense that electric discharges took place, and in the 
most perfect weather thunder rolled over the city. 

Out of the midst of this city of bustle and noise enor- 
mous columns of dust swept up by day and by night. They 
formed into clouds such as may be seen during the erup- 
tion of a volcano; mushroom-shaped clouds, forced down by 
the higher air-currents and gradually torn into shreds by the 
wind. 

To ships out at sea the effect was of a great, chalk-white 
island, several miles in extent, floating in the air. Some- 
times the dust would float over to New York, and descend 
on the city like a rain of fine white ashes. 

The working ground was here about four hundred and fifty 
yards in length, and stretched some four miles inland. It 
was excavated in terraces lower and lower. The deepest 
terrace of all, at the mouth of the tunnel, was to he about two 
hundred and twenty-five yards below the level of the sea. 

To-day a flat region of marsh land was being marked off 
with a multitude of bright-colored pegs; to-morrow a sandy 
stretch was to be dealt with in the same way ; the day after, a 
gravel-pit, a stone-quarry, a great basin of conglomerates, 
sandstone and chalk; and, finally, a ravine, so deep that the 
men working in it when seen from above were like insects — 
they seemed so small and gray, covered as they were with 
the white dust. Twenty thousand men labored away day 
and night upon these tasks, their picks and shovels glittering 
like specks of sunlight on the sea. A horn sounds, a great 
bowlder tilts forward, quivers and falls, masses of men dis- 
appear in the resulting dust-waves. Steam hoisting-engines 
groan and moan, chains of buckets rattle and creak, cranes 


68 


THE TUNNEL 


swing, cars whizz through the air. Pumps, day and night, 
drive streams of dirty water through giant pipes. 

Fleets of small locomotives with trucks dart under the 
dredgers, force their way between bowlders and over sand- 
hills. The moment they reach open land again, they scurry 
away, whistling shrilly and with deafening bell signals, down 
the barrack-street to the building ground with their load of 
sand and stone. Hither the trains have brought veritable 
mountains of sacks of cement, and gangs of workers are 
engaged in erecting permanent barracks, strong enough to 
give harborage to all the twenty thousand during the winter 
months. 

Some distance away from the cutting — where the grass 
begins to incline at the gentlest angle — there stand four 
sinister-looking engines, apparently brand new, all smoking 
and puffing. In front of their wheels, picks and shovels 
glitter in the sun. A band of men are busying themselves 
removing the earth, and replacing it with blocks of stone, 
which they rattle down the slope out of tilting carts. On 
the stones they fix sleepers which are still sticky with tar, 
and when they have laid a row of these they screw the rails 
on to them. And when they have laid sixty yards of rail 
the four black engines begin to puff and hiss, and to move 
the steel links three or four times. Then they return to their 
work with their picks and shovels. 

The four black monsters move about in this way all day 
long, and presently they stand between two high hills of 
rubble stones. A little later they stand lower down still in 
a passage between two steep walls of concrete, and gaze with 
their cyclopean eyes at the great stone wall in front of them, 
where, at a distance of thirty paces, two great arches have 
been excavated at the mouth of the Tunnel. 


PAET II 


> 


PAET II 


I 

UNCLE TOM” 

In France and at Cape Finisterre, and at the two Atlantic 
stations, troops of sweating men were eating their way into 
the earth in just the same fashion. Day and night, the same 
clouds of smoke and dust rose simultaneously at these five 
points of the globe. The army of the hundred thousand was 
made up of all races — Americans, French, English, Germans, 
Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, mulattoes, negroes, Chinese. 
There was a babel of tongues. The engineers were mostly 
Americans, English, French, and Germans. Their most 
important task was to construct the power works, Allan^s 

Niagara,” which would give him driving force for the trains 
that were to run from continent to continent, and provide 
light and ventilation for the endless galleries of the Tunnel. 

In accordance with the improved system of the Germans 
Schlick and Lippmann, Allan had enormous reservoirs 
made, into which the sea flowed at flood tide, to thunder 
thence into basins at a lower level, shooting down to force 
the turbines which drove the stream from the dynamos, and 
thence back into the sea. 

Iron huts and rolling-stock from Pennsylvania, Ohio, 
Oklahoma, Kentucky and Colorado, Northumberland, Dur- 
ham, South Wales, Sweden, Westphalia, Lorraine, and France 
were included among Allan’s requisitions. The coal mines 
made special efforts to increase their output so as to cope 
with the increased demand for transport and for smelting 
furnaces. Copper, steel, and cement experienced an un- 
exampled rise in price. The great machine manufactories 


72 


THE TUNNEL 


of America and Europe began to work in double shifts. In 
Sweden, Kussia, Hungary and Canada entire forests were 
cut down. 

A fleet of cargo-steamers and sailing vessels was continually 
under weigh between France, England, Germany, Portugal, 
Italy and the Azores, and between American and Bermuda, 
transporting men and material. 

Four steamers with leading experts on board (most of 
them French and German) were cruising about unceasingly, 
with a view to supervising and controlling the direction of 
the Tunnel within a section thirty miles in width, in accord- 
ance with known oceanographic soundings. 

All the stations and centers of industry, as well as the 
steamers, kept in direct telegraphic communication with the 
Tunnel Syndicate Building, Allan holding all the strings of 
his great enterprise in his own hands. 

A few weeks of sustained effort had enabled him to get 
the whole machinery into regular working order. His name, 
almost unknown previously, now flashed like a meteor all 
over the world. 

Thousands of newspapers occupied themselves with his 
personality and career, and presently there can scarcely have 
been a newspaper reader in the world who did not know all 
about him. 

His life story, however, as thus retailed, had a gap in it 
from his tenth to his thirteenth year. Allan had belonged 
to those hidden millions who spend their existence under 
the ground, and of whom none thinks. 

He was born in the eastern coal district of America, and 
the earliest impression fixed in his memory was of fire. This 
fire stood of nights at different points of the sky. It seemed 
to him as though there were fiery heads upon thick, sturdy 
bodies, and that they wanted to frighten him. They came 
out in the form of red-hot hills, upon which red-hot men 
poured water until all vanished in great white clouds. 

The air was full of smoke and vapor, and of the noise of 
blast furnaces. Generally it was dark, but at moments the 
whole sky was ablaze. 


UNCLE TOM” 


73 


The men would congregate in groups in the streets of 
brick-built houses, they came and went everywhere in crowds — 
they were always black with coal dust — they had coal dust in 
their eyes even on Sundays. All their conversation seemed 
to turn upon the two words, Uncle Tom.” 

His father and his brother Fred were working in the Uncle 
Tom mine like all the others. 

The street in which Mac grew up was nearly always ankle 
deep in a gleaming black mud. A shallow stream flowed 
hard by. The scanty grass that grew in patches along its 
banks was more black than green. The stream itself was a 
dirty black, sprinkled with iridescent drops of oil. Behind 
it stood long rows of coke-ovens, and behind them again 
rose trestles of wood and iron, on which small trucks ran 
unceasingly. But what caught young Mac’s attention most 
of all was a monstrous wheel which stood in the open air. 
This wheel would remain at a standstill for a time, and then 
go round with a whirr and so quickly that you couldn’t see 
the spokes. Suddenly the spokes would become visible again, 
and the wheel would slow down and stand still again. Then 
once more it would go round with a whirr, as quickly as 
ever. 

In his fifth year, Mac learned from Fred and other young 
associates how money could be made without capital. You 
could sell flowers, open carriage doors, pick up walking sticks 
that people dropped, fetch motor cars, and do business in 
newspapers which you picked up in empty railroad coaches. 
Mac eagerly began his career in the city on these lines. He 
handed over all his earnings to Fred, and this qualified him 
for frequenting the saloons with the latter and his friends. 
He learned, too, how to get through the day without spending 
a cent. He lived like a parasite on everything that helped 
to carry him along. The next thing was for him to start 
in business on his own account. He gathered together empty 
beer bottles from the workers where new buildings were going 
up and sold them, saying : Father has sent me.” 

But he was caught doing this and severely punished, and 
this particular business came to an end. 


74 


THE TUNNEL 


In his eighth year Mac’s father gave him a gray cap and a 
big pair of boots which had belonged to Fred. The boots 
were so loose that, with a shake of his feet, he could send 
them flying into the corner. 

His father took him by the hand and led him to the mine. 
This day left an indelible impression upon Mac’s brain. 
He could stiU remember vividly how, all excitement and 
alarm, he stepped through the clattering mine-house, hold- 
ing on to his father. ‘‘Uncle Tom’^ was in full swing. 
The air quivered with harsh noises, small trucks rushed past, 
railroad trucks lumbered along, everything was in movement. 
High up whirred the great wheel which he had seen from a 
distance for years past. Behind the coke-ovens rose masses 
of flames, white clouds of smoke ascended and soot and coal 
dust descended; there was a buzzing and hissing in pipes 
the thickness of a man, cascades of water poured forth, and 
out of the high factory chimney there issued columns of 
black smoke. 

The nearer they came to the soot-covered brick houses with 
the cracked window-panes, the louder and wilder became 
the din. There was a screeching as of a thousand children 
being tortured. 

“Who is screeching so, father?’^ asked Mac. 

“It is the coal that is screeching.” 

His father went up the steps of a great quivering house, 
in the walls of which there were cracks, and opened the door 
a little. 

“Morning, Josiah! I want to show the kid your ma- 
chine,” he called out, and then turned round and spat on 
the steps. “ Come along, Mac I ” he cried. 

Mac glanced into the great clean hall with its pavement of 
flags. The man named Josiah had his back turned towards 
them. He was sitting on a comfortable chair, his hands on 
brightly polished levers, and gazing motionless on a gigantic 
cylinder at the further end of the hall. A signal-bell 
sounded. Josiah moved one lever and the great machines 
to right and left began to swing their limbs. The cylinder, 
which seemed to Mac as big as a house, moved more and 


UNCLE TOM” 


.75 


more speedily, and round it whizzed a black wire rope as 
thick as a man’s arm. 

The cage is going to the sixth level,” his father explained. 

It falls quicker than a stone. J osiah is working with eight 
hundred horse-power.” 

On a white bar in front of the cylinder arrow-marks were 
moving up and down, and as they came level with each 
other, Josiah again moved a lever and the cylinder slowed 
down and stood still. 

Mac had never seen anything so tremendous as this wind- 
ing machine. 

Thanks, Josiah,” said Mac’s father, but Josiah did not 
turn round. 

They went round the machine-house and up a small iron 
staircase upon which Mac in his heavy boots could only move 
with difficulty. They were mounting in the direction of 
the shrill, moaning, child-like cries, and the noise was now 
so intense that one could no longer understand a word. The 
hall was immense and dark and full of coal-dust, and of 
clattering little trucks. 

Mac’s heart palpitated. 

Here at this spot it was, where the coal was screeching, 
that his father handed him over to the sooty faced men and 
left him. 

Then Mac’s astonishment was evoked by the sight of a 
■stream of coal. Countless lumps of coal went tumbling 
down a slide a yard wide until at last they dropped through 
a hole in the floor, like a black waterfall, and into railroad 
cars imderneath. On either side of this long, slide stood 
sooty faced boys, little fellows of Mac’s own age, who 
snatched quickly at certain lumps of the coal and picked 
them out and threw them in the iron cars. 

One of the small boys called to him to look out. This 
little fellow’s face was entirely black from coal-dust, and it 
was only after a time that Mac got to recognize him by his 
hare-lip. He came from Mac’s neighborhood, and Mac had 
had an encounter with him only the day before, having called 
him by his nick-name, Hare.” 


76 


THE TUNNEL 


have to get hold of the big hits, Mac,’^ he yelled in 
Mac’s ear. They haven’t to be sold with the slack.” 

Next day Mac was as well able as any of the others to dis- 
tinguish which was coal and which was slack, by the shape, 
the size, and the luster. Eight days later he felt as though 
he had been for years in this black room so full of noise and 
of coal. 

Bending over the ever-flowing river of coal, reaching out 
his hands to capture the bigger pieces — so Mac remained 
every day for two years, at his allotted place, the flfth from 
the top. Thousands of tons of coal slid past his small quick 
hands. 

.Every Saturday he received his wages, which he had to 
hand over to his father, minus a coin or two for pocket- 
money. He was nine years old and felt himself quite a man. 
When he went to the saloon on a Sunday he wore a stiff hat 
and a collar. A pipe hung from his jagged teeth; he chewed 
gum, and always had a plentiful supply of saliva between 
his tongue and his jaws. Yes, he was a grown man, and 
talked like one, though in the clear high voice of a boy who 
spent, his week in a noisy workroom. 

There were dozens of boys who even after a year of work 
had no notion where all the coal came from. Day and night 
clattered the iron doors of the shaft and the dripping cage 
unceasingly spat forth trucks of coal, day and night, flfty 
hundredweight at a time. Day and night the trucks raced 
down the iron slide of the shed, day and night they made 
their way down to a particular point over an opening in the 
ground, discharged the coal into it and moved along. Thence 
the coal was moved by an endless chain, and is shaken out 
on to great sieves. It was at this stage that the noise was 
produced which sounded so much like human cries. The big 
lumps of coal were sent off in the cars. So much all the 
boys knew, but that was about all they knew. Mac had 
been saying to himself for a month past that the trucks 
which went clattering through the hall could not possibly be 
all of them used for carrying coal. And this of course was 
80. Hundreds of trucks came daily from the other mines to 


"UNCLE TOM” 


77 


"Uncle Tom/’ because it was here that all the chemical 
works were as well as the coke-ovens and the " dressing 
floors.” Mac had been round on an exploring expedition and 
had seen for himself. He knew that the coal which fell 
through the sieve was transported by a conveyor into the 
sorting floors. Here it was put into caldrons, in which 
the water washed out the coal, the slack sinking. The coal 
then ran into a huge trommel from five sieves, with holes of 
different sizes. Here it was rattled about and sorted out, 
passing through sieves and " screens.” The different kinds 
then went down channels, into different receptacles, being 
classed as round coal, mixed coal, nut-coal 1, 2, and 3, and 
fell into the railway and were carried off. As for the " fine ” 
coal, however, the slaty coal, and the slack, these were allowed 
to fall down a great perforated iron stairway which seemed 
to be standing still, but if you watched it closely you saw 
that it was in fact moving very, very slowly. In exactly two 
days, each step had reached the top, tipped over and dis- 
charged the coal into immense craters. Thence came the 
slack into the coke-ovens, to be burned into coke, and the 
gases driven down into the tall black " devils,” and turned 
into tar, ammonia and all kinds of things. This was the 
business, as young Mac had discovered for himself, of the 
chemical works of Uncle Tom. 

In his tenth year, his father gave him a suit made of 
strong, thick yellowish cloth, and a woolen kerchief and took 
him for the first time to where the coal came from. 

The iron gates clattered, the bell rang, the cage went down. 
At first slowly, then very swiftly — so swiftly that Mac thought 
the ground had given beneath him. Eor a moment he felt 
queer, but only for a moment. The iron cage sank down 
noisily to a depth of nine hundred yards, clanking violently 
against the guiding rails as it went. Water splashed down 
on them; the dripping black boarding that lined the shaft 
shone faintly in the glare of their safety-lamps. Mac felt 
that this was as he expected. For two years he had seen 
the miners coming out of the cage and going down in it 
with their safety-lamps, and only twice had anything hap- 


THE TUNNEL 


78 

pened amiss. Once the cage had come up with a hang 
against the roof, and the men had suffered injuries to their 
heads; on the other occasion the cable had broken, and two 
inspectors and an engineer had been thrown out into the 
dump. Such an accident might happen now, Mac knew, but 
it didn’t happen. 

Suddenly the cage stopped and they got out on Level No. 
8. They were met by two men, naked down to their waists 
and with faces so blackened as to be unrecognizable. 

‘^Brought us your youngster, Allan?” 

Yep I” 

Mac found himself in a hot tunnel, the first few yards of 
which were lit up by the lamp in the cage. Looking down 
its length, he saw another lamp gleaming in the distance. It 
was coming nearer. Presently it came close up, and with 
it a boy named Jay, whom Mac already knew, with twenty 
iron trucks rattling behind him, filled with coal. 

J ay grinned. Hullo, there he is ! ” he cried. I say, 
Mac, I won three drinks yesterday from the Poker machine. 
Hi ! Hi ! Boney ! ” 

Mac was handed over to Jay and for a month he followed 
him about like his shadow until he had learnt his work. 
Then Jay was sent elsewhere and Mac took his place. 

He was quite at home on Level No. 8, and it never oc- 
curred to him that any boy of his age could be anything but 
a pony-boy. At first the darkness, and even more the ghostly 
stillness, had depressed him. He felt now quite ashamed of 
his fears. It was as silent as a grave, but a fellow could 
whistle, after all. The only sounds he could hear came from 
the shaft, when the trucks were being put into the cage or 
taken out of it, and from the seams where the miners, for 
the most part invisible to Mac, were excavating the coal. At 
one point of the Level there was a borer at work. Here the 
noise was tremendous. Two men, who must have been 
deafened long ago, were busy pressing the pneumatic borer 
against the rock with their shoulders. Here, not a word 
could be heard. 

Eight hundred and eighty men were at work on Level No. 


« UNCLE TOM” 


79 


8, and yet Mac seldom saw any one. Occasionally a master- 
miner, or an inspector — that was all. It was always an 
event when a lamp shone in one of the galleries and some 
visitor made his appearance. Mac spent all his time going 
to and fro along these desolate, dark, low passages. He had 
to collect the trucks at the working faces of the seam, and 
to take them to the shaft. Then he went hack with the 
trucks, some of them empty, some filled with stone to block 
up an excavated seam, some with props, beams and planks 
for buttressing up the galleries. He was familiar with the 
entire labyrinth of galleries, knew every single beam that 
had been cracked by the inward pressure of the mine, could 
tell you the names of all the seams — George Washington, 
Merry Hunt, Fat Billy, etc., etc. He knew the danger- 
points where the heavy mine gases came out. He knew every 
cofiBn-lid,” as they call the short props driven into the 
stone, which are apt to spring out and jam you against the 
opposite wall. He knew about the ventilating system — ^the 
series of doors which even the strongest man could not open 
until he had let out through a little opening in it the air 
pressing against it — ^the air which then rushed through like 
a cyclone. Some of the galleries were so full of moist, hot 
air that perspiration burst from your face as soon as you 
went into them. Hundreds of times a day he passed in and 
out of these galleries, hot and cold, just as so many thousands 
of pony-boys are doing to-day. 

'^en his day’s work was done, he went up in the cage 
with his mates, to return again next morning, just as a 
clerk goes to his office and comes down from it by the 
elevator. 

It was on Level No. 8 that Mac made acquaintance with 
Napoleon Bonaparte, ^^Boney” for short. That was the 
name of the gray horse that drew the trucks. Boney had 
been working down there in the darkness for many years and 
was half blind. His back was bent, and his head sank down 
to the ground, owing to the necessity of stooping in the low 
passages. Boney had so worn his old hoofs in the muddy 
pools between the narrow rails that they looked like cakes. 


80 


THE TUNNEL 


He was long past his prime, and his hair was going. Eonnd 
his eyes and nostrils he had red rings, which were not pleasant 
to see. But in other respects all was well with him. He 
was fat and sturdy, and had grown phlegmatic. He always 
walked at the same pace. His brain apparently had fixed 
the pace, and now it could not be changed. Mac might 
whisk his brush at him, he would go no faster. Mac might 
hit him, ^^Boney,’^ the old humbug, would pretend to make 
a spurt; he would shake his head quicker up and down and 
do some extra business with his old hoofs in the mud and 
make other demonstrations of zeal and goodwill, but not a 
jot faster would he go. Mac was not over-gentle with him. 
When he wanted Boney to go to one side he would give him 
a dig in the paunch with the elbow. Boney paid no attention 
to this, although he recognized that he ought to leave Mac 
room and pricked up his ears to show as much. When 
Boney fell asleep, as often happened, Mac hit him over the 
nose with his fist — for Mac could not afford to dally. If he 
didnT keep good time with his trucks, out he would go. 
They were good friends, Boney and he, none the less. Now 
and again, when Mac had whistled himself out, he would 
pat Boney on the neck and begin talking with him: Well, 

old Boney, how are you to-day, my lad?’^ 

After six months’ acquaintance it occurred to Mac that 
Boney was dirty. It was only in the darkness, seen in the 
glimmer of a lamp, that he could pass for a gray. Had he 
been brought out into daylight, the poor beast might well 
have felt ashamed of his appearance. 

Mac made a start by buying a curry comb. Boney, it 
was quite clear, had no recollection of this toilet requisite, 
for he moved his head round inquiringly when Mac first 
used it. This was a thing Boney wasn’t in the habit of do- 
ing, even for an explosion. He liked the operation and 
swung his great belly from side to side in his efforts to get 
the utmost enjoyment out of it. But when it came to water — 
for Mac was going to do the thing thoroughly — Boney’s 
flanks quivered as though he had had an electric shock and 
he moved his legs nervously. He was patient under the 


UNCLE TOM’^ 


81 


combing process which followed, but when he felt that Mac 
had combed enough, he emitted a tremulous sort of half- 
whine, half-howl — ^his nearest approach to a neigh. Mac 
laughed until the galleries resounded. 

Mac had been really fond of Boney. Even now, after all 
these years, he used to talk of him, and he had always since 
then taken a special interest in old grays. He would often 
stop and pat the neck of one and say : Old Boney looked 

just like this, Maud, look at him ! But Maud had seen so 
many of these horses like Boney ” that she began to doubt 
whether the resemblance was very great. Mac knew nothing 
about pictures and had never spent a cent on one, but Maud 
once discovered a very primitive drawing of a gray horse 
among his belongings. She had been married to him for 
more than two years when she discovered this craze’’ of 
his. They were driving over the Berkshire hills one day 
when suddenly he stopped the car. 

Do look at that gray, Maud ! ” he had said, pointing to 
one in the shafts of a cart. 

Maud burst out laughing, ^^Well, Mac,” she said, ^Hhat’s 
a very ordinary old gray, like thousands of others.” 

Mac had to admit that this was so. ‘‘Perhaps it is, but 
I had once a gray exactly like it.” 

“When?” 

“When?” Mac looked beyond her. There was nothing 
so difficult for him as talking about himself. “ Oh, ever so 
long ago. In Uncle Tom.” 

One other thing Mac had retained from Uncle Tom — a 
shrill cry like that of a bird of prey. He had recourse to 
it unconsciously when any one risked being run over by his 
car. He had used it to urge on old Boney, or to make him 
pull up, when a truck got off the lines. 

Mac had been nearly three years on Level 8 when the 
great catastrophe took place which is still vivid in the rec- 
ollection of many people. It cost two hundred and sixty- 
two men their lives, but to Mac it was destined to bring good 
fortune. 

Three days after Whitsuntide, at three o’clock in the morn- 


S2 


THE TUNHEE 


ing there was a fire-damp explosion on the lowest Level of 
Uncle Tom. 

Mac was bringing back his string of empty trucks and 
was whistling a popular tune which the gramophone in J ohn- 
son^s Saloon was just then bellowing forth every evening. 
Suddenly he heard above the din of the iron trucks what 
sounded like a distant thunderclap. He looked round him 
mechanically, still whistling : the props and beams had 
broken like wooden matches and the mine was collapsing. He 
tugged Boney by the halter with all his might and yelled 
at him Hi ! Hi ! Get up I Boney, frightened by the 
cracking of the props, set off at a gallop, extending his fat 
body to its utmost, and throwing out his old legs with an 
energy born of desperation — then vanished beneath the 
avalanche of stone ! 

Mac ran for his life. He escaped. But now to his con- 
sternation he saw the props and beams in the direction he 
was making for were breaking too and the roof giving in. 
He rushed round twice in a circle like a top, his hands to 
his ears, then made for a door to one side. The whole 
gallery came crashing down, the door began to crack, and 
Mac made a rush for it. He ran and ran, but found he was 
still running in a circle. 

He began to tremble in aU his limbs and lost all his 
strength. He saw that he had made his way into a stable, 
as Boney also would have done had not the mine come down 
on top of him. He had to sit down, for his knees gave 
under him, and he remained there struck dumb with terror, 
his mind a blank, for more than an hour. At last he looked 
to his lamp which was scarcely burning and held it up. He 
was completely shut in by rocks and coal. He tried hard 
to understand what could have happened but could make 
nothing of it. 

Thus he sat for a long hour crying a little the while and 
then made an effort to pull himself together. He took a 
piece of chewing gum out of his pocket and his faculties 
began to come back to him. 

Evidently it had been a case of fire-damp — ^that was clear. 


UNCLE TOM’’ 


83 


Boney had been overwhelmed hy the mine. As for himself — 
well, they would dig him out! 

He remained sitting hy his little lamp on the ground, 
having made up his mind that there was nothing to do but 
to wait. He waited two hours, then an ice-cold fear took 
hold of him and he jumped up terror-stricken. He took the 
lamp and went into the galleries to the left and to the right, 
looking for an opening in every direction. No, none! He 
could only go on waiting. He examined his provision- 
wallet, sat down again on the ground and allowed his thoughts 
to wander. He thought of Boney, of his father and Fred, 
who had gone with him to Johnson’s Bar. Of the gramo- 
phone song. Of the poker-playing machine at Johnson’s 
Bar. And in imagination he played sudden games with it — 
inserted his five cent piece, pulled the handle, let go — and, 
wonderful to relate, always won: full hand, royal fiush . . . 

A strange sound recalled him to actualities. A whizzing 
and snapping like the crackling of a telephone. He listened 
eargerly. No, it was nothing. All was still again. The 
stillness was becoming unbearable. He stuck his forefingers 
in his ears and twisted them about. He spat on the ground 
and tried to feel brave. Then once more he sat down, lean- 
ing his back against the wall and gazing idly at the heap of 
straw which had been placed there for Boney. At last he 
lay down on the straw, feeling utterly hopeless. Presently 
he fell asleep. 

He awoke — after some hours he imagined. His lamp had 
gone out, and he plunged his feet into water when he took 
a step. Squatting down he sat upon poor Boney’s last ra- 
tions. He felt hungry, and taking a handful of oats began 
to chew them, listening anxiously the while, but hearing no 
sound or voice, nothing but the trickling and dripping of 
water. 

The darkness was terrible. After a while he jumped up 
again, his teeth chattering, and moved forward quickly. He 
knocked up against a wall. Madly he beat his head against 
it, once, twice, thrice, then struck on the stone vehemently 
with his hands. His frenzy did not last long. He felt his 


84 


THE TUNNEL 


way back to the stall and began again to munch the oats, the 
tears running down his cheeks. 

Hours passed. Still no sound. They must have forgotten 
him. 

He grew cold. He must show what he was made of. 

He sprang up and shaking his fist in the air, shouted: 
‘^If those blasted fools don’t get me out, I will get myself 
out ! ” 

He began to grope about and to think hard. He tried to 
realize his bearings and the formation of this gallery. There 
was no possible escape by the gallery to the south. If he 
made his way out at all it could only be through Merry Hunt 
and Patterson’s seam. The opening of this seam was sixty, 
eighty, perhaps ninety paces off. Mac knew this well. The 
coal in Merry Hunt must have been crushed into dust already 
by the collapse of the mine. This had to be remembered. 

Only at one o’clock that day had he shouted out to Patter- 
son: ‘^Hi, Pat; Higgins says all we want is a little less 
mud here ! ” 

Patterson’s sweat-bedewed countenance had been visible in 
the circle of light given out by the lamp, and he had shouted 
out in reply : Oh, let Higgins go to the devil ! Merry 

Hunt is nothing but muck, the mine has crushed it all up. 
You tell Higgins to shut his mug, Mac ! ” 

Pat had strengthened the seam with good solid new props, 
for he had always had a fear that the rocky section of the mine 
would destroy him. The seam was steep, nearly sixty yards 
high and led by an incline to Level 7. 

Mac counted his steps, and when he had reached sixty, he 
grew excited. When he reached eighty-five and came upon 
rock, he cried for joy. 

Now he strained every muscle and sinew. After an hour’s 
hard work — ^knee-deep in water — he had excavated a big 
niche in the rock. But he felt exhausted and the bad air 
made him vomit. He had to take a rest. Presently he 
began again, quietly and steadily. It was necessary for him 
to feel the stones above and to each side in order to make 
sure they would not come down and crush him, and he had 


UNCLE TOM’" 


8S 


to insert wedges between dangerons-seeming blocks of stone 
and to drag props and beams out of the stable for nse as 
buttresses, and to roll big bowlders to one side. Thus he 
labored hour after hour, gasping for breath. Utterly worn 
out, he slept for a time. On awaking, he set himself to listen 
for a few minutes, but could hear no sound. So he set to 
again. 

He dug and dug. He went on digging in this way for sev- 
eral days and yet made only about five yards progress. Hun- 
dreds of times afterwards he dreamt that he was digging all 
over again, burrowing his way through the rocky ground. 

At last he felt sure that he was close upon the wrecked 
gallery. Eilling his pockets with oats, he made his way up 
into the gallery. Most of the props were still standing, the 
mine had only thrown down a small quantity of coal, and 
Mac trembled and cried out for joy as he noted that the coal 
could easily be shoved aside. He still had nearly sixty yards 
before him. Pushing along from prop to prop, he got gradu- 
ally up the block to the top of the seam. Keturn was im- 
possible for him, because his route was closing in behind him. 
Suddenly he came upon a coat which he recognized as Pat- 
terson’s. Old Pat lay there, crushed to death! The sudden 
horror of it so affected Mac that for long he remained 
helpless and inert. When he mastered himself, he began to 
climb again. Under ordinary conditions a man could make 
the ascent in half an hour. But Mac was weak and exhausted, 
and had to displace whole tons of coal in order to make prog- 
ress, assuring himself first that the props were still standing, 
so it took a very long time to win through. At last, utterly 
exhausted, he reached the gallery, which led direct from Level 
No. 8 to Level No. 7. 

He lay down to sleep. When he awoke he climbed slowly 
up the rut. 

At last he was above-ground. The gallery was free. 

Mae crouched down and chewed some of the oats and licked 
his damp hands. Then he proceeded towards the shaft. He 
knew Level No. 7 as well as he did No. 8, but he was constantly 
brought to a full stop in galleries which had crumbled in, andJ 


86 


THE TUNNEL 


obliged to try afresh in others. He wandered abont there for 
hours . . . He must get to the shaft — he must get to it! 
Then a pull at the bell and he was safe I 

Suddenly — just when he had begun to tremble for fear lest 
escape was impossible — ^he saw gleams of red light. Lamps ! 
Three of them ! 

He opened his mouth to shout, but he could not utter a 
sound. Or so it seemed to him. 

Perhaps he did shout really. Two of the men swore they 
heard nothing. The third said he thought he heard a faint 
cry. 

Mac’s next conscious feeling was of being carried by some 
one, then of going up in the cage, very slowly. Then it 
seemed to him that some one had thrown some covering over 
him, and that he was being carried again. He could remem- 
ber nothing more. 

Mac had been shut up in the mine for seven entire days, 
though he thought he had been only three. He was the only 
soul saved from Level No. 8. It seemed almost as though he 
were a ghost. His story was made known all over America 
and Europe. The Pony-boy of Uncle Tom Mine,” he was 
called. Portraits of him as he was carried out, and as he sat 
up in bed in the hospital, appeared in all the papers. 

The whole world laughed over Mac’s first remark when he 
awoke. He said to the doctor, Got any chewing-gum, sir ? ” 

In eight days Mac was all right again. When they answered 
his questions about his father and Fred, he put his thin 
hands to his face and cried as a boy of thirteen does when left 
alone in the world. Apart from this, all went well with him. 
He was given plenty to eat, and people sent him cakes and 
wine and money. Finally a rich lady who had been moved 
by his story adopted him and arranged for his education. 

Mac couldn’t think of any other possible career than that 
of mining, so she sent him to a mining college. When his 
training was over he went back to Uncle Tom as a mining 
engineer. After two years there he was sent to the Juan 
Alvarez silver mine in Bolivia — a region in which a man has, 
above all things, to know the right moment for delivering a 


UNCLE TOM” 


87 


straight blow from the shoulder. The mine petered out, and 
next Mac^s job was on the tunnel of the Bolivia Andes Eail- 
way. It was here that his great idea occurred to him. The 
possibility of carrying it out depended on the invention of an 
improved borer. Mac set himself to solving this problem. 
Eor the diamond of the diamond-borer must be substituted 
something almost equally hard. Mac sought admission into 
the experimental section of the Wilkinson Works, and bent all 
his energies while there to the production of a steel implement 
of hitherto unknown hardness. After working for two years 
and getting within sight of his goal, he left Wilkinson^s and 
started business on his own account. His ^^Allanite” soon 
made him well-to-do. It was then that he met Maud. He 
had never had time to trouble his head about women, and they 
meant nothing to him. Maud, however, took his fancy at 
first glance. Her Madonna-like head, with its soft brown 
hair and large, kind eyes, which in the sunlight seemed to 
glow like amber, her somewhat pathetic expression (she had 
just lost her mother), her sensitive and impressionable tem- 
perament — everything about her impressed and attracted him 
deeply. Perhaps it was her complexion that charmed him 
most of all. It was the finest and purest he had ever seen. 
She was then giving music lessons in Buffalo and working 
from early morning until night. He admired her pluck and 
courage. One evening he heard her talking about music, 
art and literature — ^matters of which he knew nothing — and 
his admiration of her talent and knowledge was boundless. 
He began to pay his addresses to her at once, and passed 
through all the stages of little absurdities common to men in 
love. At first he lacked courage, and there were hours when 
he was utterly despondent. One day he saw a look in Maudes 
eyes which inspirited him. He proposed to her there and 
then, and a few weeks later they were married. The following 
three years he devoted to his Idea. 

And now, to-day, he was Mac ” — plain Mac ” — the hero 
of popular songs in every music hall ! 


II 


TIME TELLS 

Duriitg the first few months after the launching of the great 
project Maud saw her husband very seldom. She had early 
come to realize that this new enterprise of his was a very 
different matter from his work in the factory in Buffalo, and 
she was wise enough and strong enough to sacrifice herself 
to it. Often she did not see him at all during the day. 
Either he was at the building ground, or at the workshops in 
Buffalo, or else engaged at important board meetings. He be- 
gan his work at six in the morning, and it kept him absorbed 
until late at night. Utterly fatigued, he would sometimes 
lie down on the leather couch in his working-room and sleep 
the night there instead of coming home. 

To this too Maud resigned herself. 

But to ensure his having at least some physical comforts 
on such occasions, she arranged that he should have a bedroom 
with a bath-room attached and a small sitting-room in which 
he could have a meal served — quite a comfortable little habi- 
tation — in the Syndicate building; and she saw that he was 
properly supplied there with pipes and tobacco and clean 
linen. She placed ^^Lion,^’ the Japanese, at his disposal. 

Lion knew better than anybody else how to look after Mac. 
He was able, with Asiatic equanimity, to say a hundred times 
over if necessary, with a little measured pause between the 
words : Dinner, sir ! Dinner, sir ! He never lost pa- 

tience, and his mood was always the same. He was always at 
hand, and never in the way. He worked noiselessly and stead- 
ily like a well-oiled machine always in perfect order. 

This resulted, indeed, in her seeing still less of Mac, but 
she bore herself bravely. When the weather allowed, she 
made arrangements for little dinners on the roof of the Syn- 

88 


TIME TELLS 


89 


dicate building, from which there was an entrancing view 
of New York. These dinners, to which some of Mac’s friends 
and colleagues would be invited, gave her hours of happiness 
and she used to devote the entire day to arranging one. Nor 
did she worry unduly if Mac — as sometimes happened — was 
able to appear only for a few minutes. 

Sundays, however, always saw Allan at home in Westchester 
with his wife and little girl ; and it would almost seem as if on 
these occasions he sought to make amends for all his absences 
during the week, so exclusively did he devote himself to them, 
playing about like a simple happy boy. 

Often, too, on Sundays he would go out with her to the 
building ground in New Jersey, just to give Hobby a shove 
along.” 

Presently there came a month which was almost entirely 
given over to conferences with the founders and principal 
shareholders of the Syndicate, as well as with other financiers, 
engineers, agents, and architects. In New Jersey they had 
come up against unexpected difficulties; in Bermuda the 
building of the Tunnel had resulted in unforeseen troubles; 
in Finisterre, the supply of workers was inadequate and un- 
satisfactory — ^new workmen would have to be secured. Prob- 
lems of every kind, all of the utmost urgency, had been ac- 
cumulating from day to day. 

Allan was now working as much as twenty hours a day, and 
for days at a time Maud had no communication with him at 
all. 

He assured her that things would be different in a few 
weeks, when the first rush was over. She possessed herself 
in patience. Her only anxiety was lest Mac should overtax 
his powers. 

Maud was proud to be the wife of such a man. The thought 
of his great enterprise uplifted her. She loved seeing him 
referred to in the papers as the conqueror of the submarine 
continents,” and reading all the enthusiastic descriptions of 
his work. She was still not quite used to the idea that her 
Mac had become a very famous man. Sometimes she would 
glance at him with eyes full of wonder and awe. And yet 


90 


THE TUNNEL 


she would reflect that he didn’t seem a bit changed. He 
looked still quite simple and ordinary. She was almost afraid 
that his public fame might pale a little when people came to 
realize what a simple soul he really was. She kept a keen 
lookout for all the newspaper allusions to him and to the Tun- 
nel. Sometimes she would go to a moving-picture theater to 
see herself as Mac’s wife/’ snapped ” coming out of their 
motor car, her bright dust-cloak fluttering in the wind. News- 
paper men took every possible opportunity of interviewing 
her, and she would laugh till she almost cried next day when 
she found the article under some such heading as : Mac’s 

wife says he is the best husband and father in New York.” 

V Although she did not admit it even to herself, it flattered 
her when people in the shops looked at her curiously; and 
one of the greatest triumphs of her life was when Ethel Lloyd 
on one occasion stopped her car on Fifth Avenue and pointed 
her out to her friends. 

Mac had promised to spend three whole days with them at 
Christmas — without any work whatever. And Maud’s heart 
beat with pleasure at the thought. It should be just such a 
Christmas as the first they had spent together. Hobby should 
be there on one of the days and they would all play bridge 
until they fell from their chairs! She sketched out a pro- 
gramme for every minute of the three days. 

During the first weeks of December, as it happened, she 
scarcely saw Mac at all. He was closeted all day with the 
financiers, making preparations for the financial campaign 
which was to be taken in hand in J anuary. 

A sum of three thousand million dollars was required to 
start with. 

For weeks together the Syndicate building was besieged 
by reporters, for the Tunnel had all along been a God-send to 
the newspapers. Now they wanted particulars as to all the 
stages of its construction. How was it to be administered? 
What system of ventilation was being adopted? How had 
the exact curve of the Tunnel been calculated? How was 
it that the total length of the Tunnel was about one-fifth 
less than the shortest steam route? Stick a needle 


TIME TELLS 


91 


through a globe and you find the answer/^) These and other 
such questions kept the public open-mouthed. In addition, 
there was always the steamship companies^ campaign against 
the Tunnel to talk about — the great Tunnel War still be- 
ing fought with noise and bitterness. 

The section of the press which was against the Tunnel 
kept bringing forward all the old arguments. It was impos- 
sible to bore through such an enormous stretch of granite and 
gneiss. A depth of from 5,000 to 6,000 yards beneath the 
sea-level precluded all possibility of success for such an enter- 
prise. No material could withstand the enormous heat and 
air-pressure. In short, the scheme was destined to complete 
failure. The papers in favor of it, on the other hand, kept 
reminding their readers of the actual features of the project. 
Punctuality! Security! The saving of time! — ^these were 
the watchwords. Trains would be run through the Tunnel 
as safely as overground — more safely even, for they would not 
be in danger from bad weather, storms and fogs. Nor would 
they run the risks to which steamers were liable. The case 
of the Titanic was recalled and that of the Cosmos, which went 
to the bottom with four thousand on board. 

It was unnecessary to talk about airships, for there could 
be no question of their being available for general traffic, 
though two of them had succeeded in flying across the Atlan- 
tic. 

It was impossible to take up a paper of any kind without 
coming upon some reference to the Tunnel or some illustra- 
tion in connection ;with it. 

In November there had at first been some diminution, and 
then a complete dearth of new information emanating from 
the publicity department of the syndicate. Allan had closed 
the building grounds, and photographs henceforth were not 
to be procured. 

The fever of interest which the newspapers had wrought in 
the public mind died down, and after a few weeks the Tunnel 
had become an old story, which evoked no sort of excitement. 
The latest sensation was the International air-race round the 
world. 


92 


THE TUNNEL 


The Tunnel was quite forgotten. 

This was according to Allan’s plan. He knew his people 
and knew well that all this early enthusiasm had brought him 
his four thousand million dollars. He himself would be able 
to arouse a new wave of enthusiasm — ^without having recourse 
to mere sensationalism — at the right moment. 

In December a widely discussed piece of news was published 
in the newspapers, which served to give some idea of the 
range of Allan’s enterprise. This was to the effect that the 
Pittsburg Smelting and Eefining Company had secured for 
the sum of twelve and a half million dollars the right to all 
the material excavated during the building of the Tunnel 
suitable for their purposes. (Shares in the P. S. E. C. went 
up 60 per cent, during the first six years of the great work.) 
Simultaneously appeared the announcement that the Edison 
Biograph Company had secured the sole right to take photo- 
graphic and cinematographic records of the Tunnel during the 
whole period of its construction for the sum of a million 
dollars. 

The Edison Biograph Company advertised their coup on 
immense posters. They announced that they proposed to pro- 
duce a memorial for all time of the building of the Tunnel 
from the first shove with the spade to the starting of the first 
train! They would tell future generations the whole story 
of the greatest human achievement in all history! They 
would present their films first of all to New York, and then 
in thirty thousand moving-picture theaters all over the world. 

It was impossible to think of a better advertisement for the 
Tunnel. 

The Edison Biograph Company began its series that same 
day in its two hundred New York theaters, which were all 
packed to the full. 

They showed once more the familiar scenes enacted on 
the roof-garden of the Atlantic Hotel, they showed the five 
great columns of smoke and dust ascending from the isolated 
building grounds, the fountains of stones thrown up by 
dynamite, the arrangements made for feeding a hundred 
thousand men, and the arrival of the workmen in the morning. 


TIME TELLS 


93 


THey showed one man who had been struck on the chest by a 
piece of stone, and who was still breathing, though on the 
point of death. They showed the hospital of the Tunnel 
city. They showed lumbermen in Canada cutting down an 
entire forest for Allan, and long strings of loaded cars all 
marked with the initials A. T. S. 

This set, which took ten minutes to show, and which bore 
the simple title, Eailroad cars,^^ made the strongest impres- 
sion of all. Freight-trains — that was all! Freight trains 
in Sweden, Eussia, ' Austria, Hungary, Germany, France, 
England, America. Train after train, carrying wood, coal, 
rails, iron ribs, tubes, and a thousand other things. 

At the end came a quite short set — Allan on his way with 
Hobby to the building ground in Hew Jersey. 

Every week the Edison-Bio Company had something new 
to show about the Tunnel, always ending up with a set show- 
ing Allan himself doing something or other. 

Whereas Allan^s name had previously meant as little to the 
public as the name of any record-breaking aeroplanist which 
was on all men^s lips to-day, who broke his neck to-morrow, 
and was forgotten the day after, people began now to learn 
definite items of information about him and his work. 

Four days before Christmas New York, and all the towns 
of the United States, large and small, were placarded with 
enormous posters in front of which great crowds congregated 
open-mouthed. These posters depicted a fairy city, a bird’s- 
eye view of an ocean of houses. Never had such a city been 
dreamt of before! In its center, which shone brilliantly as 
New York on a sunny morning, rose a magnificent railroad- 
station, compared with which the Hudson Terminal, or 
the Grand Central and Pennsylvania stations, were mere toys. 
From it radiated a number of deep-lying thoroughfares, in- 
cluding one which led to the north of the Tunnel. All these 
were spanned by innumerable bridges, and flanked by gardens 
and terraces with fountains in full play. A solid mass of 
thousand-windowed sky-scrapers towered to each side of the 
railway station square. All around were boulevards and alleys 
crowded with people; some walking, some driving in motor 


94 


THE TUNNEL 


cars, some traveling by electric railways running on different 
levels. Beyond, endless blocks of buildings, stretching out 
to the horizon. In the distance lay the harbor, a fascinat- 
ing picture, with its warehouses and docks, its busy quays, 
its steamers and sailing-ships, its funnels, masts, and rigging. 
In the foreground, to the right, an endless sunlit strand, 
full of basket-chairs, and faced by lofty Hotels de luxe. 
Beneath were the words, Mac Allan^s cities in ten years^ 
time.” 

In the upper portion of the picture, high in the bright blue 
sky, could be seen a solitary aeroplane no bigger than a sea- 
gull. The pilot was evidently throwing overboard something 
which looked in the distance like grains of sand, but which 
grew in size until at last they took the form of leaflets, some 
of which, falling right into the town, were big enough to 
reveal the words : Buy Building Plots ! ” 

This was one of Hobby’s notions! 

On the same day full-page display advertisements of a 
similar kind appeared in all the great newspapers. Every 
available section of wall space in New York was placarded. 
In every office and restaurant, bar, saloon, in all the trains 
and stations and ferry boats, Allan’s fairy city on the sand 
dunes displayed its charms. The whole of New York felt 
as though it had already been to Mac Allan’s city ! 

Certainly, the fellow knew how to advertise. 

All bluff and fake, of course I The biggest piece of bluff 
in the world! 

But for every ten who so talked, there was always one who 
shouted hack : Bluff ? Eubbish, man ! You take it from 

me. Mac is a man who makes good. You wait a bit.” 

What really was one to think about it all? Were such 
fairy cities a possibility or probability of the near future ? 

Next day the newspapers began to publish answers to this 
question from men of note — bankers, captains of industry 
statisticians, publicists of all kinds. They agreed that three- 
fourths, if not nine-tenths, of the traffic between the two con- 
tinents would go by the Tunnel, and that the traffic would 
increase enormously — perhaps tenfold, perhaps much more. 


TIME TELLS 


95 


Ho one could tell. Immense crowds of people certainly wonld 
be pouring daily into the Tunnel cities. It was possible that 
in twenty, fifty, or a hundred years^ time they would have 
acquired enormous dimensions, almost impossible for us, with 
the comparatively limited population of to-day, to guess at. 

Next day Allan published particulars as to the prices of 
land. 

He had not the effrontery to ask the kind of prices that 
prevailed in Manhattan, where it was a case of covering a 
square yard with thousand dollar notes, but his prices were 
unblushing enough to dumbfound the strongest spirits. The 
real estate agents nearly went off their heads. They were 

inarticulate in their rage : Who the ! What the ! 

How were they to earn their living if this fellow Allan were 
allowed to rake in all the dollars ? 

Why, it was the biggest land speculation the world had 
ever seen! This rascal Allan had bought up sandy deserts 
by the square mile, and was selling them as building land by 
the square yard. In the cheapest quarters of his infernal 
Tunnel cities he would be clearing hundreds per cent., in the 
dearest thousands per cent. 

But the individual speculators looked at each other dis- 
trustfully. They scented out secret dodges of all sorts — 
trusts, ‘‘corners.^^ Like a closed hostile phalanx they took 
up their stand against Allan^s prices. How he had the 
further audacity to^ announce that these favorable ’’ figures 
would be increased in three months^ time. Oh, would they 
indeed? The speculators laughed sardonically. Well, time 
would tell whether he would find purchasers for his mud- 
patches — and fools big enough to buy water at the price of 
whisky ! 

Time told! 

Those very steamship companies which had been so in- 
fiamed against Allan secured for themselves the best building 
sites, quays and docks. Lloyd's bank contrived to gulp down 
a big morsel, and Wanamaker another. 

And now every one had to follow suit. Every day the 
newspapers recorded fresh purchases — every one was deter- 


96 


THE TUNNEL 


mined not to be left out of it. You never could tell what 
might result from it all ! 

Allan kept going ahead. He had worked up .the public 
interest to the desired temperature, and now he was going 
to turn it to all possible account. 

On the 4th of J anuary he made his appeal in all the news- 
papers for the first three thousand million dollars, two thou- 
sand million from America and one from Europe ; one thou- 
sand million to be raised by bonds, and two in the form of 
shares. 

The prospectus contained all the essential particulars in 
regard to the costs of construction, the opening of the Tunnel, 
its possibilities of profit, etc. With an average of 30,000 
passengers every day, it would show a profit. It was certain, 
however, that an average of more than 40,000 could be counted 
upon. In addition, there would be an enormous revenue from 
freight, postal service, pneumatic tube delivery, etc., etc. 

It dealt in figures such as had never been seen before — 
amazing figures which took away the breath! 

It bore the signatures of all the founders and chief bond- 
holders of the Syndicate, including the leading bankers and 
most famous business men in the States, while, to the surprise 
of all New York, the name of Lloyd’s right-hand man, Woolf, 
until now director of Lloyd’s bank, appeared as that of the 
treasurer. 


ni 


WOOLF 

Lloyd himself had put Woolf in this position, thus connect- 
ing his name for all time with the Tunnel. 

His portrait appeared in the evening papers: a worthy, 
earnest, somewhat corpulent gentleman of an Oriental cast 
of feature — swollen lips, a strong, crooked nose, short, dark, 
crisp hair and short dark beard; his eyes dark, prominent, 
melancholy. 

‘‘ Began as a dealer in old clothes. Is now Financial 
Treasurer of the A. T. S., with two hundred thousand dollars 
a year. Speaks twelve languages.’’ 

The old clothes ” item was an invention which Woolf 
himself had perpetrated himself once in jest. But there was 
no doubt about the fact that Woolf had risen from the ranks. 
Until he was twelve he had, as Samuel Wolff sohn, trudged 
about in the mud of his native Hungarian village and kept 
himself alive on raw onions. His father was a washer of 
dead bodies and a grave digger. In his thirteenth year he 
entered a bank in Budapest as an apprentice, and remained 
there five years. Here in Budapest his shoes began to pinch, 
as he expressed it himself. Discontent, consciousness of power 
and ambition drove him to a desperate resolve. He set himself 
frenziedly to the mastering of English, French, Italian, 
Spanish, Eussian, and Polish, his brain absorbing all these 
languages quite without difficulty, like blotting-paper. So 
as to familiarize himself with them the more, he became a 
peddler of carpets, an orange seller, a waiter, a student in 
turns. His goal was Vienna. He got there eventually, but 
here also his shoes pinched. He felt tied down. Berlin was 
his next step. 

He packed another hundred thousand syllables into his 
97 


98 


THE TUNNEL 


memory and learnt the foreign newspapers off by heart. In 
two years’ time he succeeded in getting a job with a stock- 
broker on a bare living wage. But even in Berlin his shoes 
pinched him. 

He said to himself that he must move on to London, and he 
bombarded the London banking houses with offers of service. 
Without result. They did not want him. However he was 
determined to make them want him. His instinct made him 
take up Chinese. This difficult language he absorbed like 
the others and he practiced talking with Chinese students 
whom he recompensed with postage stamps. He lived almost 
as economically as a dog. He never gave tips, not a penny. 
He had the nerve to ignore the insolent resentfulness of the 
Berlin waiter. He never took the electric railway, but walked 
everywhere painfully on his flat feet, which were much 
troubled with corns. He gave lessons in languages for 80 
pfennig, and he undertook translations-. Money! Money! 
Money ! His ambition tortured him. He felt he had no time 
for rest or recreation, no time for sleep or love-making. 
Humiliations and misfortunes could not curb his spirit. 
Suddenly he decided to venture all on a single throw. He 
gave up his billet. His teeth had to be made presentable, so 
he went to a dentist to whom he had to pay thirty marks. He 
purchased a pair of the latest thing in boots, had a suit of 
clothes made for him by an English tailor and turned up in 
London as the finished article — a gentleman. After four 
weeks of fruitless effort he knocked up against a Wolffsohn 
at Tayler and Terry’s the bankers, a man who had already 
passed through the same kind of metamorphosis. This 
Wolffsohn spoke as many languages as he himself and thought 
it would be good fun to try to puzzle his new friend with the 
few words of Chinese that he knew. 

But he didn’t succeed in doing so. It was the greatest 
success of the younger man’s life. The London Wolffsohn 
sent for a Chinese interpreter and found to his astonishment 
that the young alien was a really good Chinese scholar. Three 
days later young Samuel was once again in Berlin, but not to 
stay there. He was now Dr. C. Wolf son (without an ^^h”). 


WOOLF 


99 


of London, and he continued his journey that evening in 
a wagon-lit towards Shanghai. In Shanghai he felt happier. 
Here he had air to breathe in. But even here his shoes 
pinched him. Moreover there was no passing himself off as 
an Englishman, no matter how carefully he imitated his 
fellow clubmen. He decided to be baptised and become a 
Catholic, though no one had tried to induce him to do so. He 
saved money (his old father was able now to give up the 
washing of dead bodies) and set out for America. Here at 
last he could breathe really freely. Here at last his shoes 
were roomy and comfortable. The line was free, and he could 
go full steam ahead, using all the energy he had stored up in 
him. He now dropped the last syllable of his name, as a 
lizard does its tail, and called himself Sam Wolf, but in order 
that he might not be taken for a German he inserted a second 
o.^^ He disguised his English accent next, shaved off his 
mustache, and began to talk through his nose; he took to 
singing cheerfully as he walked about and in hot weather was 
always the first to appear in his shirt-sleeves. He lay back 
like a true-born American citizen to have his boots blacked. 
But he had arrived at a point where the world could not go on 
shaping him any more. He had had to go through all the 
various changes down to date in order to be really himself. 
After some years on the Wool Exchange in Chicago, he came 
to Hew York. Now at last he had come to his natural abid- 
ing place. His rarige of knowledge, his natural genius, his 
unparalleled powers of work soon brought him to the very 
forefront and he began to tread firmly and steadily in his 
patent-leather shoes upon the backs of others just as others 
had done upon his. He abandoned, however, the loud voice 
of the broker and became genial and amiable. And as an 
outward symbol of the fact that he had arrived and could 
afford to do as he pleased, even to cultivating an individual 
appearance, he allowed a short beard to adorn his chin. 

In New York a piece of good luck befell him very similar to 
that which he had experienced in London. He came upon 
Lloyd. He was at the Union Exchange at this time, by 
no means yet at the top of the tree. Fate so willed it that 


100 


THE TUNNEL 


he had to venture upon a small maneuver against Lloyd. 
He made two clever moves and Lloyd — a past-master in 
maneuvering — felt that he was up against a man of talent. 
These were not the tactics, he said to himself, of P. Griffith 
and T. Lewis. No, this was something new. Accordingly 
he made Mr. Woolf’s acquaintance and engaged his services 
forthwith. Woolf rose and rose — there was no stopping him. 
At forty-two — somewhat corpulent and a little asthmatic — 
behold him installed in his place of honor in the Atlantic 
Tunnel Syndicate! 

Woolf had made only one pause on his journey upwards, 
hut it was one that cost him dear. He had lost his heart to 
a pretty Viennese girl in Chicago and had married her. Her 
beauty lasted only a short time and nothing remained but a 
quarrelsome, arrogant, ailing wife who worried him to death 
by her jealousy. Only six weeks ago she had died. He did 
not grieve over her. He sent his two boys to a boarding- 
school in Boston, to be educated as cultured young Americans. 
He found a little flat in Brooklyn for a fair-haired young 
Swedish woman who was taking lessons in singing. Then 
he drew a deep breath and began work for the Syndicate. On 
the very flrst day he made himself acquainted with the names 
and personalities of every member of his immense staff 
of sub-managers, confldential clerks, cashiers, book-keepers, 
junior clerks, stenographers and typists; on the second day 
he had the strings of the whole business in his hands ; on the 
third it seemed as though he had held his post for years. 

Lioyd had recommended him for it as being the most re- 
markable flnancier whom he had ever met, and Allan, to whom 
Woolf’s personality was alien and antipathetic, was obliged 
to admit before a week was out that he was at least a most 
wonderful worker. 


IV 


THE PUBLIC COMES IN 

The prospectus was out and the Tunnel began to suck in the 
dollars. 

The bonds were for a thousand dollars. The shares were 
for a hundred, twenty and ten. 

The great bare hall of the New York Stock Exchange was 
at its noisiest on the allotment day. For many years nothing 
had been put upon the market the probable fate of which was 
so uncertain. It might be brilliant, it might be a fiasco. 
The speculating world was in a fever of excitement but was 
inclined to hold its hand, nobody having the courage to start 
first. But Woolf had spent several weeks traveling about in 
sleeping cars and had satisfied himself as to the attitude 
which would be taken up by the heavy industries, which had 
the biggest interests in the Tunnel. He was not in the habit 
of concluding any negotiation until satisfied that he could 
count on his man. Thus it came about that punctually at 
ten o’clock the representatives of the heavy industries started 
a rush. They acquired seventy-five millions of dollars’ worth 
of bonds. 

The dam had burst. 

To Allan what mattered most, however, was that the general 
public should come in. He did not want the Tunnel to be 
financed by a little gang of millionaires, he wanted it to be 
the work of the People, the work of America, the work of all 
the world. 

Surely the People would rise to the occasion! 

Mankind has always been disposed to marvel at daring and 
at wealth. There is nothing men fear so much as death and 
hunger, and daring and wealth stand for victory over death 
and hunger. 


101 


102 


THE TUNNEL 


Barren of thought itself, the great public always jumps 
at new ideas, as a refuge from its own dullness, A vast army 
of newspaper readers, it enjoyed being excited three times 
a day by the recorded adventures- of men and women whom 
it had never seen; depressed by its own impotence and 
poverty, it stood agape, watching the manifold activities of 
the rich and famous. Exciting experiences were the lot of 
the favored few. For countless thousands and tens of thou- 
sands there was nothing in existence. Existence was a con- 
tinual struggle to them, so unrelenting, so exhausting that 
many could not support it but for the cheap momentary 
relaxations offered them by the theater and the music-hall, 
the movies and the prize ring. Monotony was the bane 
of the people. A new tune — that was what they wanted. 
They are sick to death of the old tunes. 

And Allan was giving them a new tune. A new tune that 
was worth while, a new tune hammered out of iron and 
charged with electricity — a tune of their own day and in 
time with the beat of the railways clattering unendingly over 
their heads. 

Here was a man who did not pretend to peg out claims in 
eternity, who did not come talking unintelligible nonsense to 
them about the unseen. He stood for the present, he wasn’t 
trading in dead pasts or incalculable futures. He promised 
you something definite and tangible, something you could 
get a grip on. He was proposing to dig a hole through the 
earth. That was all. 

Yet simple though the proposition was, they could realize 
how daring it was too. And then the millions involved ! 

At first, the money of the small investor came dribbling in 
very, very scantily, but soon the driblets grew into streams. 
The words Tunnel Shares” buzzed throughout the world. 
People recalled how this man and that had made their fortunes 
through Victoria Mines shares and Continental Eadiums. 
These Tunnel shares might throw all other such things into 
the shade. It was not a question of making a thousand dollars 
or so. It was a chance of making a haul big enough to keep 
you comfortable for the rest of your life. 


THE PUBLIC COMES IH 


103 


Week after week a river of men flowed over the granite 
steps of the Syndicate Building. The shares were to be 
bought at a hundred other places, hut there was a general 
desire to get them from the fountain-head. Chauffeurs, 
waiters, elevator-boys, clerks, shop-girls, manual laborers, 
thieves — J ews and Christians, American-born and immigrants 
— ^men of every race under the sun and of every variation 
of color, rubbed shoulders as they waited their turn and 
joined in excited talk over shares and dividends. 

On many days the pressure was so great that the officials 
had not time to pile up the money. They simply threw it 
behind them for other employees to pick up and stow away in 
great baskets. The stream of money seemed to grow steadily 
in volume as the days advanced. It was a strangely fascinat- 
ing sight for the eyes of almost penniless men. A mere 
handful of those hundred-dollar notes — just a real crowded 
handful — and they, poor ciphers now, would be men indeed! 
They passed out of the building, their brains rocking as 
though drunk, dreaming mad dreams of wealth. 

In Chicago, St. Louis, San Francisco, in all the cities, big 
and little, of the United States., similar scenes were being 
enacted. There was scarcely a farmer or a cowboy or a 
miner in the whole length and breadth of the land who was 
not speculating in A. T. S. shares. 

The Tunnel sucked in the money like a giant with an un- 
quenchable thirst. 


V 


A BUSY MAN^S WIFE 

The great machine was working at high pressure now. 

It was an axiom of Allan^s that everything could be done 
in half the time one was told it would require. And every 
one who worked with him got in the way of keeping time 
by him. 

The immense Syndicate building, suggestive of a thirty- 
two-storied bee-hive made of iron and concrete, was in a 
never-ceasing whirl of work and energy from morning till 
night, from its treasure-holds in the basement to its Marconi 
station on the roof. Its eight hundred rooms hummed with 
the activities of officials, clerks, typists innumerable. Its 
twenty elevators shot up and down continually. There were 
elevators which went only to the tenth floor, elevators which 
went only to the twentieth, and one which went right up to 
the top. There was an elevator upon which one stepped while 
it was moving. There was not a wasted square yard of space 
in the whole structure. There were Post and Telegraph 
offices, counting house offices, offices for everything, ships, 
iron, steel, cement, wood. Until late into the night, the 
Building shone out dazzlingly in the midst of the rush and 
bustle of Broadway. 

A gigantic advertising design of Hobby’s contriving, formed 
by thousands of small lights, extended over the entire front- 
age of the four highest stories. It took the form of an 
immense chart of the Atlantic Ocean, framed in the colors 
of the Stars and Stripes. The Atlantic was represented by 
blue waves, rising and falling. To the left lay North 
America, to the right Europe with the British Isles, standing 
out compactly like two clusters of shining stars. Tunnel 
City, Biscaya, Azora, Bermuda and Finisterra were indicated 


A BUSY MAN^S WIFE 


105 


by red-colored lights which gleamed forth like beacons. On 
the Ocean, nearing Europe, was a steamer vividly depicted 
by lights. She was not moving however. Beneath the rising 
and falling waves gently curving lines of red lights outlined 
the Tunnel, passing Bermuda and the Azores on its way to 
Spain and France. Through the Tunnel an endless succession 
of fiery trains shot to and fro between the continents: trains 
of six cars, starting every five seconds. Above this dazzling 
design could be read in great broad simple letters, which 
emitted a haze of milk-white radiance, the words ‘^Altantic 
Tunnel.^’ 

The greater the excitement round Allan and his affairs, 
the better he felt. He was in the best of humors. He 
looked, too, in the best of health, alert and vigorous. His 
eyes had got back their genial, boyish expression, their quiet, 
steady look. Even his mouth, of late compressed, seemed 
to soften and smile more easily. He ate with more appetite 
and enjoyment, and slept soundly, dreamlessly. 

Maud, on the other hand, showed signs of suffering in her 
face. Her bloom and freshness had disappeared. Her youth 
seemed to have fied, and she had passed from a girl into a 
woman. Her cheeks were no longer rosy. She was thinner 
and paler. She had an anxious, careworn expression on her 
face, and lines creased her forehead. 

She was miserable. 

In February and March she had had some beautiful weeks 
which had made up to her to some extent for the dull and 
weary winter. She had gone with Mac to Bermuda and the 
Azores. While on the sea she had had Mac to herself almost 
all day long. But on their return she had found it harder 
than ever to settle down. 

Mac now was on the move for weeks together — Buffalo, 
Chicago, Pittsburg, Tunnel City. He spent most of his time 
in trains. And when he returned there were always accumula- 
tions of work waiting for him. 

It is true that he turned up in Westchester oftener than 
formerly, as he had promised, but even on Sundays he had 
to devote himself to work which allowed of no postponement. 


106 


THE TIJNHEL 


Very often lie had time only to sleep and have his bath and 
breakfast. 

Maud now took up music again. She practiced assiduously 
and went in for a course of lessons. What a lot she had 
unlearnt! For two whole weeks she attended all the great 
concerts. On two evenings in the month she herself played 
in a Home for young saleswomen and waist-makers. But 
with her pleasure in music there was mingled more and more 
a dull aching longing. She began to play less frequently, 
then she gave it up altogether. Instead, she went to lectures 
on Hygiene, Ethics, the Protection of Animals, the Bringing 
up of Children. Her name began to appear on the committees 
of societies for visiting the sick and taking care of orphans — 
those modern ambulances for the wounded in the battle of 
life. 

Towards evening she would ring up Mac and the sound of 
his voice in reply always soothed her. 

^^Will you be home to dinner to-night, Mac?” she would 
ask, her ears alert for his answer. 

‘^To-night? Ho, impossible, I’m afraid. But to-morrow 
I shall manage to come. How is Edith ? ” 

Better than I am, Mac,” she would say with a laugh. 

Can you bring her to the ’phone ? ” 

And Maud, made happy by this, would lift up the little 
girl so that she could lisp out something. 

Good-by then, Mac,” Maud would say. ‘‘It doesn’t 
matter about to-night, but I won’t listen to any excuses to- 
morrow, mind ! Do you hear ? ” 

“Yes, I hear. To-morrow for certain. Good-night, 
Maud!” 

Later it often happened that Lion could not get his master 
to answer the telephone. It was impossible for him to be 
interrupted. 

And Maud, unhappy and resentful, would throw down the 
receiver, struggling with her tears. 

During the evenings she read. She got through whole 
shelves of books. But it seemed to her that most books were 
nothing but lies. Life seemed to her very different. How 


A BUSY MAN’S WIFE 


lor 

and then indeed she would come on a book which intensified 
her wretchedness and she would walk up and down the 
quiet, empty rooms, tears in her eyes. At last she happened 
on a great idea — she herself would write a book! A quite 
unique book — ^what a surprise it would be for Mac! The 
idea took complete possession of her. She spent an entire 
morning going about town trying to find the particular kind 
of album which she had in mind to use for the purpose. At 
last she found the very thing — Abound in alligator skin and 
with yellowish paper. Immediately after lunch she set to 
work. On the opening page she wrote : 

The Life and sayings of my little daughter Edith, 

WRITTEN BY HER MOTHER, MaUD. 

‘^May God protect her, my sweet Edith,” she wrote on 
the second page. And on the third she began : To begin 

with, my sweet little daughter was born on the . . .” 

Mac should be given the book as a Christmas present. The 
task kept her delighted and absorbed during several evenings 
which she had to spend alone. She noted down conscien- 
tiously every tiniest detail of her little daughter’s daily life — 
all her quaint expressions, all her questions, wise and simple, 
all her opinions and remarks. Sometimes, however, her mind 
would wander from the book and she would become lost in 
her own thoughts and feelings. 

It helped her to live on from Sunday to Sunday, when 
Mac visited her. These Sundays were real festivals to her. 
She saw to it that the house looked spick and span, and 
she composed a special menu which should make up to Mac 
for his scratch” meals during the week. 

But it happened sometimes that he did not come even on 
the Sunday. 

On one Sunday he was suddenly called away to the steel- 
works in Buffalo. On the following Sunday he brought 
home with him the superintendent of the building ground in 
Bermuda, Mr. Schlosser, and Maud saw practically nothing 
of him, as he and his guest spent the entire day discussing 
technical questions. 


108 


THE TUNNEL 


One afternoon that week Maud arrived at the Syndicate 
Building at an unusual hour, and sent word to Mac by Lion 
that she wished to speak to him at once. 

As she stood waiting in the room adjoining Mac’s office, 
she heard a thick guttural voice repeating a number of names. 

Manhattan . . . Morgan Co. . . . Sherman . . 

She recognized the voice of Woolf, whom she could not 
abide. Suddenly he stopped and she heard Mac cry out: 

Immediately — tell her I will come immediately. Lion.” 

Lion returned and gave his message in a low voice. 

I can^t wait. Lion ! ” Maud exclaimed. 

The Japanese looked embarrassed as he turned to go back 
to his master, his eyes blinking. 

Almost simultaneously Mac entered the room, looking in 
the best of spirits. 

He found his wife with her pocket-handkerchief to her 
face, weeping bitterly. 

^^Maud?” he cried anxiously. What’s the matter? 
Anything wrong with Edith?” 

Maud only sobbed louder. Edith! Edith! He had no 
thought for her, for herself. Might not something be the 
matter with her? Her shoulders shook with her sobs. 

I simply can’t stand it any longer,” she sobbed, burying 
her face deeper still in her handkerchief. It seemed as though 
her tears would never stop flowing. All her misery and 
bitterness must out. 

Mac stood by her, not knowing what to do or to think. 
At last he touched her shoulder and said, I say, Maud dear, 
I couldn’t help Schlosser’s spoiling our Sunday. He had 
come over here specially from his station and it wasn’t pos- 
sible for him to stay more than two days.” 

^^It isn’t that at all. That one Sunday ! Yesterday 

was Edith’s birthday ... I had been waiting ... I had 
felt . . .” 

Edith’s birthday ! ” cried Allan, really taken aback. 

" Yes. You had forgotten, I suppose ! ” 

Mac was at a loss. He was thoroughly put out. ^‘How 
could 1 have forgotten it ! ” he said. I did think about it 


A BUSY MAN’S WIFE 


109 


the day before yesterday.” After a brief pause he continued, 
^‘Look here, Maud, I have to keep so many things in my 
head just at present. Only just now while we are making a 
start . . 

Maud sprang up and stamped with her foot, her eyes flash- 
ing scorn, while the tears continued to course down her cheeks. 
^‘That’s what you always say — ^you have been saying it for 
months past ! Oh, I’m utterly sick of life ! ” she sobbed out 
and threw herself into the arm-chair again, covering her face 
once more with her handkerchief. Mac felt more helpless 
than ever. He stood there getting redder and redder in the 
face like an embarrassed schoolboy. Never had he seen Maud 
before like this. 

Listen, Maud,” he began agfain. It’s a ease of there 
being more work than one man can get through, but it will 
soon be better.” And he besought her to have patience for 
just a little longer and meanwhile to pass the time by going 
to theaters and concerts. 

“ Oh, I have tried all that already,” she replied, and it’s 
no use. It bores me to death. And it’s always the same 
thing — ^waiting, waiting, waiting ! ” 

Mac shook his head and gazed at her helplessly. 

‘^Well, what are we to do with you, girlie?” he asked. 
^^What shall we try? Would you like to go into the country 
for a bit ? ” 

Maud lifted her head quickly and looked at him with moist, 
expressionless eyes. 

‘‘Do you want to get rid of me?” she asked. 

“ I want to do what is best for you, dear, that is all. You 
are making me very unhappy — really you are ! ” 

“ I don’t want to make you unhappy . . .” Maud began, 
but the sobbing broke out anew and she could not continue. 

Mac took her on his knee and tried to soothe her with 
caresses. “ I shall come home to-night,” he ended by declar- 
ing, feeling now that everything had been comfortably settled. 

Maud dried her tears, now beginning to smile. 

“Very well. But if you come later than half-past eight, 
we part forever. I have often thought we should have to 


110 


THE TUNNEL 


part/’ she said. No, Mac ! ” she went on seriously but lov- 
ingly. ‘^No, that is no way to treat a wife.” She put her 
hot cheek up against his bronzed face and whispered : Oh, 

I love you so, Mac ! I love you so ! ” 

Her eyes were shining as she went down in the elevator from 
the thirty-second floor. She felt well and happy, and was 
already a little ashamed of her ill-humor. She thought of 
Mac’s discomflture, the trouble in his eyes, his helplessness, 
and also his bewilderment at her inability to realize the im- 
portance of all this work. What a goose I have been ! ” 
she said to herself. ‘^What must Mac think of me? He 
must think I have neither courage nor patience nor any 
understanding of his work. And what a silly I was to let 
him see that I had even considered the possibility of leaving 
him.” 

Allan gave Lion orders to see that he was out of the ofiice 
punctually by a quarter to eight. Two minutes before the 
hour he rushed into a store and purchased a heap of presents 
for Edith, and some for Maud, without making much effort 
at selection. 

She is quite right,” he thought to himself, as his motor 
rushed northwards. And he cudgeled his brains to discover 
some way to And more time for devoting himself in future to 
his family. But to no purpose. The truth was that his 
work was increasing instead of diminishing, from day to day. 
^^WTiat am I to do?” he asked himself. wish we could 
find a substitute for Schlosser. He isn’t self-reliant enough.” 

Then he remembered that he had some urgent letters in 
his pocket which he must sign. He read them and affixed his 
signature. By Harlem Eiver he had finished with the lot. 
He stopped the car and had them posted. It was now half- 
past eight. 

Take the Boston Post Eoad, Andy, and let her rip, but 
don’t run over anybody,” he said to the chauffeur. 

Andy let her rip down the Boston Post Eoad in such fashion 
that pedestrians staggered back and a mounted inspector fol- 
lowed full gallop only to be hopelessly outdistanced. Mac 
stretched out his legs on the seat in front of him, lit a cigar. 


A BUSY MAN’S WIFE 


111 


and closed his tired eyes. He had almost fallen asleep when 
the car pulled up. The whole house was gayly illuminated. 

Maud ran down the steps like a young girl and threw her 
arms round his neck. As they walked through the front 
garden to the door she exclaimed, Oh, I am such an utter 
goose, Mac ! ” 

From now on she promised herself and him she would be 
patient and never complain again. 


VI 


MAUD’S EESOLVE 

Maud kept her word but it was not easy. 

She no longer complained if Mac remained away on Sunday 
or brought home so much work that he could scarcely devote 
a minute to her. Mac, she told herself, had undertaken a 
superhuman piece of work, one which would have killed any 
other man, and it was up to her ” not to add to his burdens. 
The only way she could help was to make his scanty moments 
of leisure as delightful as possible. 

Whenever he returned to her he found her in good spirits, 
and she never allowed him to discover that she had been 
fretting all day for him. And, strange to say, it never even 
occurred to Mac that she could be unhappy. 

The summer passed, autumn came. The leaves yellowed 
and fell in heaps from the trees in front of Allan’s house, 
where they lay waiting for a breath of wind to scatter them. 

Mac asked her one day whether she would not like to move 
to Tunnel City. She concealed her astonishment. He ex- 
plained that he had to go there twice a week, and that he 
was contemplating devoting an hour or two every Sunday 
morning to a sort of reception at which every one employed 
there, from the head engineer to the day laborer, could put 
before him his requirements or difficulties. 

‘‘ If you wish it, Mac ! ” 

I really think it would be best, Maud. I shall transfer 
my office work to Tunnel City so far as I can. I’m afraid, 
though, it will be rather lonely for you out there.” 

It won’t be worse than in Westchester, Mac,” she replied, 
smiling. 

The removal was to take place early in the New Year. 
While making preparations for it Maud would often stop and 

112 


MAUD’S KESOLVE 


113 


ask herself: God! how shall I occupy myself in that 

desert of cement ? ” 

She must find something to do that would keep her busy 
and drive away foolish thoughts and fancies. 

At last a splendid idea occurred to her, and she set herself 
eagerly to prepare for putting it into execution. She felt 
a different person, and went about smiling so mysteriously 
that even Mac noticed it. 

She amused herself for a while by provoking his curiosity 
but she was not able to keep her secret to herself for very 
long. Well, it was just this. She must have something to 
occupy her, something worth doing, some real work. Not 
just something to distract her. Why not work in the Tunnel 
City Hospital? No, Mac was not to laugh. She was abso- 
lutely in earnest. She had already begun a course in hospital 
work — in Dr. Wassermann’s Children’s Hospital. 

Mac looked thoughtful. 

Have you really made a start ? ” he asked, still incredu- 
lous. 

‘‘Yes, Mac, I began four weeks ago. Now I am provided 
with an occupation when we move to Tunnel City. If it 
weren’t for that I couldn’t get on.” 

Mac was dumb with astonishment. Maud was delighted 
as she watched his face. Presently he nodded his head, 
thoughtfully. 

“ I dare say it is a good thing, your having work to do,” 
he said simply and seriously, “ but whether hospital 
work Suddenly he burst out laughing. He had con- 

jured up a picture in his mind of his little Maud in nurse’s 
uniform. “Shall you insist on a high salary?” he asked 
jestingly, rather to Maud’s annoyance. 

He regarded her plan as the expression of a mood, a passing 
fancy. He did not believe it would last. Even now he did 
not realize how essential it really was for her to have some- 
thing to occupy her mind. She was annoyed that he should 
take so little trouble to try and understand her. 

“In the old days it did not seem to matter,” she said to 
herself next day. “ I must have changed.” 


114 


THE TUNNEL 


That evening she was alone. It was raining hard, and 
the air was fresh and cool. She sat writing in her journal. 

She was noting down sundry remarks that had been made 
by Edith, and illustrated the naive inhumanity and the 
childlike egoism of her idolized little daughter — characteristics 
common to all children, as she was careful to add. She 
expressed her thought thus: ‘^It seems to me that only 
mothers and wives can really live unselfishly. Men and 
children cannot. Men are just big children, with this differ- 
ence: they can be unselfish and sacrifice themselves in the 
small outward, you might almost say the unessential, matters 
of life. Their deeper, their really important habits and de- 
sires they never put aside for the benefit of one they love. 
Mac is a man and like all men an egoist. I cannot refrain 
from this criticism, although I love him with all my heart.” 

Having satisfied herself that Edith was sleeping soundly, 
she put on a shawl and went on to the verandah. Here she 
sat listening to the falling rain. To the south-west in the 
distance was the dusky glow of New York. 

When she got up to go to bed, her glance fell on the book 
lying open on the table. She read what she had written, and 
although in her heart she was a little pleased with her own 
wit and wisdom, she shook her head and wrote underneath: 
^^An hour later, after listening to the falling rain. Am I 
right in my criticism of Mac ? Is it not I who am the egoist ? 
Does Mac ever require anything of me? Is it not I who 
require Mac to sacrifice himself? I believe that everything 
I have written here is utter nonsense. Somehow nothing 
seems to go right to-day. The rain is coming down beauti- 
fully. It is the giver of peace and sleep. Mac's little 
donkey/' 



' . ♦ 


' ' ' • t 


I 






I* . , 

i \ • 

1 . 


PAET III 


i 




* 


* 




! 


s 


V 



\ * 





PART III 


I 

INTO THE DARKNESS 

Meanwhile Mac Allan’s boring machines at the five working 
centers had eaten their way for the depth of a league into 
the darkness. The tunnel mouths looked like two awful 
gateways leading down into the underworld. 

By day and by night, without a pause, endless trainloads 
of stone came rushing at express rate out of these gateways ; 
and by day and by night, without a pause, workmen and 
trains of materials went in at mad speed. The double open- 
ings were like dark inflamed wounds, ever discharging and 
drawing in blood afresh. In the depths within there was the 
raging activity of thousands of human hands. 

Mac Allan’s work was something utterly new in the world’s 
history. It was madness, a hellish struggle to save every 
second. His path was a rush through the stone. 

With such machines and such boring equipment as he 
possessed and with the working methods of former times, 
Allan would have required ninety years for the completion of 
his task. But he did not work for only eight hours a day — ■ 
he worked for all the twenty-four. He worked through 
Sundays and holidays. He worked with six shifts of men in 
the excavation. He compelled his men to give, in four hours, 
an output of work that would have been the result of eight 
hours at the old slow rate. 

The place where the boring machines worked, the head of 
the drift, was known among the Tunnel men as ‘‘Hell.” 
The din was here so awful that in spite of plugged ears almost 
all the workers became more or less deaf. Allan’s borers, as 
they cut their way into the working face of the rock, set up 


118 


THE TUNNEL 


a shrill ringing sound, and the rock cried out like a thousand 
children in their death agony, laughed like an army of mad- 
men, raved like a hospital of fever-stricken wretches, and at 
last roared as with the thunder of a great waterfall. Through 
the blazing hot working galleries, for five miles, there arose 
the fearful din of indescribable sounds and discords, so that 
no one would have heard a warning crash even if the whole 
mass of rock had suddenly collapsed in ruin. And as the 
deafening noise would have swallowed up words of command 
or bugle signals, every order had to be given by optical devices. 
Huge refiectors flung out their dazzling cones of light, now 
gleaming white, now blood red, athwart the chaos of sweat- 
streaming knots of men, isolated figures, tumbling blocks of 
stone, that themselves looked in the obscurity like falling men, 
and the dust rose whirling like thick clouds of steam in the 
reflected rays. And in the forefront of this chaos of strug- 
gling men and falling rock there quivered and crept ever on- 
wards a gray dust-covered mass, like a monster of primeval 
ages — Allan’s great boring machine ! 

Allan had planned it down to the smallest of its details. 
It was like a monstrous armored cuttle-fish, with insulated 
electric wires and motors for its intestines, men working 
stripped to the skin in the hollow of its head, and a tail of 
cables and wires dragging behind it. Driven by an energy 
that might compare with that of two express locomotives it 
crept forwards, and while a brilliant light shot out from its 
jaws as it worked with the lips, feelers and antennae of its 
variously armed mouth, it gripped the face of the rock. 
Quivering as with the fury of some primeval monster, trem- 
bling with the rage of destruction, it bit its way head-deep 
into the stone, howling and thundering as it penetrated it. 
It drew back its teeth and arms, and shot something into the 
hole it had made. These teeth and antennae were borers tipped 
with Allanite.” They were hollow and water-cooled, and 
what it pushed through the hollow borers was a blasting 
explosive. Like the cuttle-fish of the sea it suddenly changed 
its color. Blood seemed to steam from its jaws, the seams 
of its back sparkled with evil menace, and it drew itself 


INTO THE DARKNESS 


119 


backwards veiled in a red mist — and then it crept forward 
again. So it went on forwards and backwards, day and night, 
for long years without a pause. 

The moment that it changed its color and drew back, a 
crowd of men flung themselves on the rock face, and in fever- 
ish haste wound together the wires that hung from the bore 
holes. Then, as if scourged by terror, the crowd dashed 
back from its work. There was a roar, a thunder, a long 
moaning echoing sound. The shattered rock came rolling 
dangerously near the fleeing men, a hail of stones pursued 
them and clattered upon the armor plating of the boring 
machine. Clouds of dust whirled around its glowing sides. 
Suddenly it changed color again to a dazzling white, and 
hordes of half-naked men swarmed into the eddying dust 
cloud, and began to hurl away the yet smoking debris. 

But the greedy monster, rolling onward, stretched out a 
terrible equipment of destruction, forceps and grippers, and 
pushing forward its lower jaws of steel, devoured rock, stone, 
and loose debris which a hundred men, with distorted features 
shining with sweat, pushed into its gaping mouth. Its jaws 
began to grind and swallow it all, its belly crawling on the 
ground worked it with a gulping movement, and behind it 
poured out a stream of crushed rock and stone. 

The hundred sweating demons that struggled above it 
among the rolling stones, dragged at chains, shouted and 
roared, as the mass of debris melted away and sunk rapidly 
under their feet. It was a rush to get the stones out of the 
way — ^that was the only means of pushing on. 

But already groups of men, black with dust, were hewing 
and digging under the jaws of the monster to smooth the 
track for its progress. Men with sleepers and rails panted at 
their work, as the sleepers were laid down and the rails bolted 
on to them, and the monster flung itself forward. 

On its dust-covered body, its flanks, its arching back, 
dwarfed looking men hung, and bored in the roof and sides 
and bottom of the gallery, and in projecting blocks of stone, 
holes that could be filled with blasting explosives and fired at 
the given moment. 


120 


THE TUNNEL 


And just as in front of the boring machine the work went 
raging on with feverish haste and demon energy, so behind 
it there was the same feverish, demoniac storm, as the stream 
of broken stones came pouring from it. For, just half an 
hour later, the machine must have a free track for two hundred 
yards behind it, so as to run back and wait for the next 
explosion. 

As soon as the stones poured out on the ever moving grid 
or screen behind the machine, workmen of herculean build 
sprang upon it and worked at the great blocks that no human 
strength could lift. As they moved upon the grid that 
stretched some ten yards behind the machine, they fastened 
to the cranes that projected from its sides chains they had 
slung round the blocks, and then they were swung up and 
away. The movement of the grid shook the crackling and 
rattling heaps of stone into low-built iron trucks, like those 
of a coal mine, which ran in endless succession from left to 
right along a half-circle of tram line, stopping behind the 
grid only for the few moments that were needed to receive 
their load of blocks and debris. They were drawn by a mine- 
locomotive, driven by storage batteries. Groups of men, with 
pale faces and a crust of dirt on their lips, pressed around the 
grid and the trucks, rushing, turning, shoveling and shouting, 
and the fierce light of the electric projectors beat down with 
merciless, blinding force upon them, while the blast of air 
from the ventilating shaft blew over them like a hurri- 
cane. 

The struggle around the boring machine was like a mur- 
derous battle, and every day there was a toll of wounded and 
often of deaths. 

After four hours of mad work the gangs of men were sent 
away. Utterly exhausted, boiled in their own sweat, pallid 
and only half conscious, they flung themselves on the damp 
stone heaps in the wagons, fell asleep at once and only woke 
as they came out into the daylight. The workers used to sing 
a song that had been composed by one of themselves. The 
song began thus : 


INTO THE DAEKNESS 


121 


** In there where the tunnel thunders. 

In the hot hell, O my brothers. 

Gee, how hot a hell it is! 

A dollar extra for an hour 
For an hour a dollar extra, 

Mac will pay us for our sweat.” 

Hundreds fled from the hell/^ and many after a short shift 
of work there broke down completely. But a continual supply 
of new recruits was always waiting to take the place of those 
who fell. 


II 


FOEWAED ! 

The little mine locomotive went rattling for a mile or more 
through the Tunnel till it came to the place where the big full- 
gauge railroad trains were waiting. There the little trucks 
were swung up on cranes and emptied. As soon as the wagons 
were loaded the trains started off — a dozen or more in each 
hour — while other trains bringing men and material came 
rolling in. 

Towards the end of the second year the boring from the 
American side had been pushed forward for about sixty miles. 
Along all this enormous length of the excavation the work 
went on with feverish, raging energy. For Allan unceasingly 
— daily, hourly — scourged men on to the utmost effort of 
exertion. Without a moment’s hesitation he dismissed the 
engineer who failed to exact the excavation of the required 
number of‘ cubic yards, and as mercilessly discharged the 
workman who had broken down. 

Where the iron trucks were rattling by, and the roughly- 
bored tunnel was still full of dust, rock splinters and a deafen- 
ing din, battalions of workmen were busy by the light of the 
electric projectors, fitting together uprights, baulks and planks 
of timber, to make the boring safe from falls of rock. A band 
of experts laid down the electric cables, and arranged a 
temporary system of pipes and hose for the water and for the 
air that was pumped into the galleries. 

Eound the trains gangs of men crowded to unload the new 
materials and distribute them along the workings, so that 
when any one wanted anything he had only to stretch his 
hand and take it — ^beams and planks, clamps and girders, 
screw bolts, cables, borers, blasting cartridges, chains, rails 
and sleepers. 


122 


FOEWAED ! 


123 


At every three hundred yards one found a gang of dusky 
figures at work with raging haste between the upright posts 
of the gallery, boring into its walls. They were cutting and 
blasting out an opening about as high as a man, and as a train 
came yelling past them they had to fly for safety to the spaces 
between the posts. But soon the opening was so deep that 
they need no longer trouble themselves about the passing 
trains. Then in a few days more the rock wall in front of 
them rang hollow, and they broke through and found them- 
selves in a parallel gallery, where the trains were rushing past 
as in the other one. Then they went three hundred yards 
further on, to take in hand the cutting of a similar cross 
passage. 

These cross communications served for ventilation and a 
hundred other purposes. 

But on their heels followed another gang whose task it was 
to line these connecting passages with carefully-finished walls 
of masonry. Year by year they did nothing else. But every 
twentieth passage was left in the rough as it was originally 
bored. 

Forward — ever forward went the work. 

A train came roaring in, and stopped by the twentieth 
cross passage. A crowd of grimy men sprang from the 
wagons, and carrying on their shoulders drills, picks, girders, 
sacks of cement, sleepers, rails, pushed with headlong speed 
into the cross passage. Forward! The train rolls away. 
The passage has swallowed up the grimy gang of workers. 
There is the shrill sound of the drills, the sharp note of ex- 
plosions as the rock is bored and blasted; the passage is 
widening and enlarging. It Joins the main tunnel at an angle. 
Its walls are of iron and concrete. So is its floor and its roof. 
A railroad track is laid along it, and it becomes a siding. 
These sidings are planned so that at every six thousand yards 
the ever-moving trains of material or debris-laden trucks can, 
if desired, be shunted from one of the main galleries to the 
other. 

In this extremely simple way a stretch of six thousand 
yards can be isolated and cleared for construction work. 


124 


THE TUNNEL 


The six thousand yard long forest of baulks, posts, poles 
and cross ties thus changed itself into a six thousand yard 
long structure of iron frames and plates. 

If there was a “ hell,” there was also a purgatory.” And 
just as there were ^^hell men” who worked at the driving 
forward of the Tunnel, so there were ‘^purgatory men,” for 
the place where this construction work went on was known as 
“ purgatory.” 

Here there was a free track, and a sea of railroad cars 
poured into this section of the Tunnel with swarms of men 
hanging on to them. The battle began at a hundred points 
at the same time; now were heard reports like cannon shots, 
bugle calls, and was seen the flashing of the electric projectors. 
The gallery was enlarged to the required height and width by 
blasting. Girders and rails were thrown thundering on the 
ground. The Tunnel was full of ironwork brightly daubed 
with red lead paint. Frames and plates came pouring into 
the place from the iron works of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and 
Indiana. The old rails were torn up. Dynamite and melinite 
broke up the ground, and pick and shovel were busy turn- 
ing it over. Look out! Here comes a shouting, panting 
gang with distorted mouths, swollen muscles, throbbing 
arteries, curving themselves like snakes, one behind the other, 
as they bring along the foundation girders, of huge douhle- 
headed steel beams, destined to support the railroad track 
in the Tunnel, a single line in each great gallery. A party 
of engineers, with their measuring instruments and appai 
ratus, are crouching on the ground, working with every nerve 
at full stretch, while the sweat marks their half-naked bodies 
with grimy stripes. The base girder, twelve meters long 
and eighty centimeters deep and bent slightly outwards at 
each end, is embedded in concrete. It is like laying the 
keel plates of a ship. Girder is fitted on to girder, and a 
stream of concrete flows over them so that they are buried 
in it. Then come the sleepers. Next, as a hundred ants 
drag along a straw, so a hundred groaning men, with bent 
knees, bring along the great steel rails, each thirty metqrs in 
length, which are to be bolted on to the sleepers. Behind 


rOEWAED ! 


125 


them creep others bringing sections of the ribs that are to 
form an iron lining for the whole of the oval Tunnel. When 
put together, these ribs or frames have the shape of an ellipse 
slightly flattened at its lower end. Four sections fitted to- 
gether form the frame — a base section, two side pieces (the 
abutments), and a roof piece or cap. They are made of 
inch-thick iron, and joined together with strong plating. 
The Tunnel echoes to the rattling blows of the riveting 
machines. Frame joins on to frame. A lining of red painted 
iron encircles the Tunnel. And already further back the 
concrete workers are climbing among the frames, building up 
between them a three-foot thick lining of reenforced concrete, 
that no power in the world could burst through. 

On both sides of the great railway track, at a sufiicient in- 
terval, tubes of various kinds were laid down, and welded 
and screwed together — ^tubes for telephone and telegraph 
wires, for cables carrying the power current, huge pipes for 
water, great conduits into which air was being pumped con- 
tinually by machines far away in the upper daylight. There 
were special tubes for the pneumatic express post. A bed 
of sand and rubble covered the tubes. Sleepers and rails for 
the construction trains were laid over them, a solid track that 
allowed the cars laden with materials and debris to pass 
through at express speed. 

Hardly was the frame riveted up, when the railroad track 
for the six-kilometer section was complete. The trains were 
run in, and went rushing through the Tunnel, while the 
masons still hung about the iron framing, busy with the con- 
crete work. 

Fifteen miles behind the working face, where the boring 
machines were thundering, the Tunnel was already completely 
finished. 


Ill 


CHAiTGE 

But this was not all. A thousand details had to be provided 
for in advance. As soon as the tunnels bored from the 
American side joined up with those that, starting from 
Bermuda, were eating their way through the gneiss rock, 
the whole length must be ready for traffic. 

Allan’s plan had been completed, down to the smallest 
particular, years in advance. 

At intervals of ten miles he had small stations excavated 
in the rock, where the platelayers were to be posted and 
housed. At intervals of forty miles there were to be larger 
stations, and a still more important one at every one hundred 
and sixty miles. All these stations served as depots for re- 
serve storage batteries, machines, and stores of provisions. 
In the larger stations were installed transformers, high volt- 
age, refrigerating, and ventilating machines. There had to 
be, besides, branch tunnels for sidings into which trains could 
be shunted. 

For all these various works special battalions of workers 
were formed, and aU these gangs were cutting their way into 
the rock and hurling behind them avalanches of stone. 

Like a volcano in violent eruption the Tunnel mouths were 
throwing out stone by day and by night. Unceasingly and in 
quick succession, the loaded trains came rushing out of the 
yawning gateways. With an easy upward glide that delighted 
the eye, they took the steep ascent. At the top a train 
stopped for a moment, and then, what at first sight seemed 
to be only debris and rubbish suddenly began to move, andi 
off the cars there sprang blackened, begrimed, and almost 
unrecognizable men. Then the train moved on to one of the 

126 


CHANGE 


127 


hundred sidings, and was taken in a great curve through 
‘^Mac City^’ (as the tunnelmen’s town in New Jersey was 
generally called), till it reached one of the hundred tracks 
near the sea, where it was unloaded. Here, by the seaside, 
ever3dhing was easy and bright enough, for the men were 
having their light week.’^ 

Mac Allan had dug out two hundred cubic kilometers of 
stone, enough to build a rampart from New York to Buffalo. 
He owned the greatest stone quarry in the world ; but he did 
not waste a shovelful of the material. He had carefully 
leveled up the whole of a huge stretch of land, and, as it fell 
away gradually to the sea, he had raised the level, forcing 
the shallow water back for a good thousand yards. But 
beyond this, where the sea was deeper, every day thousands 
of car loads of stone were shot into the water, and gradually 
a huge embankment rose above the waves. It was one of the 
quays of Allan’s Haven, that the world had heard so mucli 
about in the advertisement of the future city. Two leagues 
further off his engineers were constructing the largest and 
best-equipped bathing strand that the world had yet seen. 
Here gigantic seaside hotels were to be built. 

But Mac City itself looked like a vast rubbish ground, on 
which no tree, no green plant grew, no beast or bird lived. It 
glittered in the sunlight so that it dazzled one’s eyes. Far 
and wide the ground was covered with railroad tracks, a net- 
work of rails with sidings branching out from them in a set 
pattern, like the magnetic figures that iron filings form at 
poles of a magnet. Over all the network trains were running, 
driven by electric motors or by steam — ever3rwhere the loco- 
motives were droning, puffing, whistling and rattling. Be- 
yond, in the temporary harbor, lay rows of noisy steamers and 
tall-masted sailing ships, that had brought iron, timber, 
cement, corn, cattle, and provisions of all kinds from Chicago, 
Montreal, Portland, Newport, Charleston, Savannah, New 
Orleans, Galveston. And to the north-east there was a thick, 
impenetrable cloud of smoke that marked the position of the 
railway station for materials. 

The rough sheds first erected had disappeared. On the 


128 


THE TUNNEL 


terraces where the works were installed there was a glitter 
of glass roofs, where the great machinery halls and the power 
stations crowded round the towering ofl&ce buldings. In 
the midst of the stony desert arose a twenty-story building, 
the ‘^Atlantic Tunnel Hotel/^ It was snowy white and 
brand new, and served as the stopping place for the crowds 
of engineers, agents, and representatives of great firms, and 
the thousands of curious visitors that came over every Sunday 
from New York. Opposite it Wanamaker had erected a 
temporary twelve-story store. Broad roads, all perfectly 
paved and laid out, ran straight across the wide space, passing 
over the railroads by bridges. But on the edge of this wilder- 
ness of stone there were comfortable villages of workmen’s 
dwellings, with schools, churches, recreation grounds, bars, 
and saloons, these last run by men who had once been 
champion borers or pacemakers in the works. Hidden away 
in a wood of little dwarf firs, there stood all alone, dead and 
forgotten, a building that looked something like a Jewish 
synagogue. It was a crematorium, with long, empty-looking 
corridors. Only one of these galleries as yet contained urns ; 
and all of these bore the same kind of inscription under the 
names — English, French, Eussian, German, Italian, Chinese 
names. The record always ran, ‘‘Killed by an accident in 
the Atlantic Tunnel — crushed by a rockfall — run over by a 
train.” They were like the epitaphs of soldiers killed in 
battle. 

Near the sea stood the new white-walled hospitals, con- 
structed on the most up-to-date system. And here, too, a 
little apart from them, was a new villa in a freshly laid out 
garden. It was Maud’s home. 


IV 


THE GAME OF PATIENCE 

Maud had managed to get as much power as possible into her 
little hands. 

She had become the superintendent of the Convalescent 
Home for Women-- and Children at Mac City. She was, 
besides, a member of a committee of doctors (among them 
some women physicians) that looked to the hygiene of the 
workmen’s dwellings and the care of young mothers and their 
infants. On her own initiative she had founded a school of 
needlework and domestic economy for young girls, and a 
club for women and girls. She had plenty to do. She had 
her Office ” just like Mac, and employed a private secretary 
and a typist. She had at her call a crowd of nurses and 
teachers — among them daughters of the first families of New 
York. 

Maud never offended any one; she was careful, friendly, 
thoughtful, her interest in the affairs of others was evident. 
All loved her, many revered her. 

In connection with her duties as a member of the Hygiene 
Committee she had visited nearly all the homes of the workers. 
In the Italian, Polish and Kussian quarters she had carried 
on an energetic campaign against filth and vermin. She 
arranged that from time to time all the houses should be 
disinfected and cleansed from top to bottom. The houses 
were nearly all built of concrete, and could be as easily washed 
out as a scullery. Her visits had drawn her near to the 
people, and whenever she could she helped them in word and 
deed. Every available place in her school of domestic economy 
was filled. She had engaged exceptionally able teachers, for 
cooking as well as for dressmaking. Maud lived night and 
day with the institutions she had founded. She had studied 

129 


130 


THE TUNHEIi 


a whole library of literature bearing on the subjects that 
concerned them, so as to master the necessary technical knowl- 
edge. And it was — to tell the truth — no easy matter for her 
to manage everything so thoroughly and so successfully, for 
she had naturally no particular talent for organization. But 
she succeeded. Amd Maud was proud of the praise that the 
newspapers gave to her foundations. 

But the special field of her activity was the Convalescent 
Home for Women and Children. 

The Home stood close beside her villa. She had only to 
pass through a couple of gardens to reach it. Every day, 
punctually at nine o’clock in the morning, she went all over 
it. She took a personal interest in each one of her patients, 
and when the budget of the hospital was exhausted she gave 
help freely out of her own purse. 

She had work, work that she enjoyed; she saw its results; 
her relations with the life of the people around her had become 
wider and more practically useful, hut Maud was honest 
enough to confess to herself that all this was not enough to 
take the place of quiet domestic happiness. 

For two or three years she had lived in the most perfect 
happiness with Mac — ^until the Tunnel came and took him 
away from her. True, Mac stiU loved her. He was indeed 
attentive to her, worthy of her love, but it was not as it had 
been before. There was no mistake about that. 

She saw him now more often than in the first years of the 
great work. He had indeed given up his ofiice in Hew York, 
but he had fitted up a work-room for himself in Tunnel 
City, where he often stayed for weeks with only brief intervals 
of absence from it. She could not complain of this. But 
Mac himself had changed. His simple ways, his frank cheer- 
fulness, that in the beginning of their married life had sur- 
prised and delighted her, were less and less in evidence. In 
his home he was as serious as he was when at work or before 
the public. He tried hard to appear to be as lively and in 
as good spirits as before, but the effort seldom succeeded. He 
was absorbed in his task, his features were thinner and harder, 
and his eyes did not lose that obvious absent-minded ex- 


THE GAME OF PATIENCE 


131 


pression whicli ceaseless concentration on one and the same 
idea will produce. 

The times were past when he used to take her in his arms 
and fondle her. He kissed her when he came and went, looked 
into her eyes and smiled — ^but her woman’s instinct would 
not let her be deceived. It is true that all through the year, 
engrossed though he was with his work, he never forgot any 
of the famous days,” such as Edith’s or her own birthday, 
and the anniversaries of their engagement and marriage. 
But Maud once saw by chance that in his pocket book these 
days were marked in red ink — and she gave a smile of resig- 
nation. He obviously noted them mechanically, no longer 
with a daily reminder of them from his heart. 

Maud liked, after her work was done, to sit with some 
sewing in her hands and give free play to thought. Then she 
always went back to the time when Mac won her. The more 
the Tunnel separated her from Mac the more persistently, 
though it both consoled and pained her, she dwelt upon 
the little experiences of her first days of married life. She 
cherished deep down in her heart a spite against the Tunnel. 
She hated the Tunnel because it had become more important 
than herself. Ah ! the little vanity of the first year had long 
since vanished. It mattered nothing to her whether or not 
Mac’s name were known in five continents. When at night 
the ghostly white glare of Tunnel City shone through her 
windows, her hatred of it was often so strong that she closed 
the shutters so as not to see it. When she saw the trains 
rattling into the Tunnel, she shook her head. It was all 
madness! But for Mac it seemed that nothing could be 
more natural. Yet, notwithstanding it all — and this hope 
kept her courage up — she hoped that some day Mac would 
come back with his heart to her. After all, the day would 
come when the Tunnel would set him free again. If only 
the first train were running through it. . . . 

But, good heavens, there were still years before that! 
Maud sighed. Patience! patience! She had always her 
work. She had her beloved Edith, who was growing into a 
little lady, and looking out on life with keen and curious eyes. 


132 


THE TUNNEL 


She had Mac oftener than before. She had Hobby, who dined 
nearly every day with her, and told all kinds of amusing 
stories, and with whom she could so easily gossip. Then, too, 
her housekeeping made greater demands on her than at first. 
Eor Mac brought many guests home with him, famous men, 
whose very names were a passport for admittance to the 
Tunnel. Maud enjoyed such visits. These celebrities were 
for the most part elderly gentlemen, with whom one could 
chat freely. They all had one quality in common; they were 
all very simple, not to say shy in manner. They were very 
learned men, who discussed geological, physical and technical 
questions with Mac, and often spent a whole week at some 
station thousands of feet below sea-level, trying to discover 
something with their instruments. But Mac chatted with 
these celebrities just as he talked with her or with Hobby. 

But when these great lions took their departure, they 
bowed low to Mac, and pressed his hand, and could not thank 
him enough. And Mac smiled his peculiar good-humored 
smile and said, All right, sir,’^ and wished them a pleasant 
journey. 

Once, too, a lady arrived. 

My name is Ethel Lloyd,’^ said the lady as she raised her 
veil. I have read so much about the schools that you 
have brought into existence,^’ she began, speaking very 
courteously and earnestly, ‘^that at last I longed to learn 
something of your methods. As perhaps you know, I have 
something to do with efforts of much the same kind at New 
York.^^ 

Ethel Lloyd had a natural dignity with a touch of inborn 
pride that was not unpleasant, and a natural frankness and 
heartiness that were charming. She had lost the childish 
airs that had pleased Allan long ago, and had become a 
thoroughly self-possessed lady. Her sweet and delicate beauty 
of earlier years had become riper. In those past years she 
had given one the impression of a pastel portrait. Now 
everything about her seemed brilliant and shining — her eyes, 
her mouth, her hair. She always looked as if she had come 
direct from her toilet table. The marks on her chin had 


THE GAME OF PATIENCE 


133 


become slightly more defined, a shade darker, but Ethel no 
longer tried to cover them with powder. 

Maud showed Ethel the hospital, the schools, the kinder- 
garten and the various rooms of the women^s club. Ethel 
declared that it was all splendid, but without indulging in 
exaggerated praise as a younger woman would have done. 
And finally she asked if she could be of use in any way. No ? 
Well, it was all the same to Ethel. At the house she chatted 
so charmingly with Edith that the child immediately took 
to her. Then it was that Maud overcame her prejudice 
against Ethel, and asked her to stay to dinner. Ethel tele- 
phoned to her father and stayed. 

Mac brought Hobby home to dinner with him. Hobby’s 
presence made Ethel feel more self-possessed than she would 
have been if only the quiet and silent Mac had been there. 
She led the conversation, she was effusive in her praise of 
Maud’s work. Maud’s jealousy awoke again. She is talk- 
ing at Mac,” she said to herself. But to her consolation Mac 
showed only the merest polite interest. He looked at the 
beautiful and accomplished Ethel just as he would have 
looked at some typist. 

The library at the women’s club seems to me rather in- 
complete,” said Ethel. 

It will be increased in the course of time.” 

‘^It would be a great pleasure to me, Mrs. Allan, if you 
would allow me to present a few books to it. Hobby, you 
will support my proposal.” 

If you have a few books to spare,” said Maud. 

A few days later Ethel sent great cases of books. Maud 
thanked her heartily, but felt sorry they had met. For 
after that Ethel came often. She acted as if she were one 
of Maud’s dearest friends, and lavished presents upon little 
Edith. At last one day she asked Mac if she might not be 
given an opportunity of visiting the Tunnel. 

Mac looked at her in amazement, for it was the first time 
a lady had put such a question to him. 

‘^That you cannot do,” he answered shortly and almost 
roughly. 


134 


THE TUNlsrEL 


But Ethel was not upset. She laughed heartily and said. 

But, Mr. Allan, have I given you any reason to be an- 
noyed ? 

After that she did not come quite so often. Certainly 
Maud had no regrets on that score. She could not like Ethel 
Lloyd, no matter how much she tried to do so. And Maud 
was one of those people who cannot get on with any one un- 
less they can really take to him. 

It was for this reason that Hobby’s society was so welcome 
to her. He came to the house every day. He came to lunch 
and dinner whether Allan were there or not. She missed 
him when he stayed away. And that, too, even when Allan 
was with her. 


V 


THE WOEK GEOWS 

Hobby is always in snch splendid spirits/’ Maud would 
often say of him. And Allan would answer, He was always 
a wonderful fellow, Maud.” 

He would smile, and never notice that in Maud’s frequent 
allusions to Hobby’s good spirits there was implied some 
slight reproach to himself. He was not like Hobby. He 
had not Hobby’s talent for cheerfulness. Hobby’s easy good 
humor. He could not, like Hobby, after a twelve hours’ 
spell, of work, give nigger dances and songs and perform all 
manner of amusing absurdities. Had any one ever seen 
Hobby doing anything else? Hobby grinned all over his 
face; Hobby rolled his tongue in his cheek and then out 
came some witty piece of mischief. Where Hobby appeared 
every one at once got ready to laugh; Hobby was bound 
to be witty, Ho, he was not like Hobby. He did not deceive 
himself. It seemed to him that for a man such as he was it 
was better to have no family interests — and this though in 
his heart he loved Maud and his little daughter. 

Hobby did his work and was free. But he, Allan, was 
never free. The Tunnel grew and the work grew with it. 
And with that he had his special anxieties, about which he 
spoke with no man. 

He was already doubting whether the Tunnel could really 
be finished in fifteen years. According to his calculations, 
it might be possible under the most favorable conditions. He 
had calmly and deliberately fixed this term in order to win 
for his enterprise public approval and the gold of the people. 
If he had fixed it at thirty or fifty years, half the amount of 
money would not have been given to him. 

But now he realized that in the time named he would hardly 
135 


136 


THE TUNNEL 


be able to get througb with the double tunnels of the Biscaya- 
Einisterra and the America-Bermuda sections. 

At the end of the fourth year of construction the galleries 
of the American section had been pushed forward 150 miles 
from the coast of America, 50 miles from the other starting- 
point at Bermuda. On the French section about 125 miles 
had been bored from the Biscaya station and 70 from Finis- 
terra. Not the sixth part of the Atlantic Tunnel was ready. 
How were the great borings from Finisterra to the Azores and 
from the Azores to Bermuda to be managed in time ? 

Then there were the financial difiiculties. The preliminary 
works, and the borings in the Serpentine rock off Bermuda, 
had swallowed up much greater sums than he had taken into 
account in his calculations. There could not be any idea 
of the second issue of three thousand millions of capital 
before the seventh year of construction, at the very earliest 
until the sixth year. He would soon be compelled to carry 
the work forward over long distances as a single gallery 
Tunnel, which would make the construction endlessly more 
difficult. How would it be possible with a single gallery 
Tunnel to get out the stone, the stone and debris that increased 
and grew in quantity so that already it threatened to block 
the galleries? It lay piled up everywhere between the rails, 
and in the cross-cuts and stations, though the trains were 
groaning under their loads. 

Allan spent months in the Tunnel trying to find quicker 
working methods. In the galleries on the American side 
each separate machine, each new invention or improvement, 
was tested, before it was brought into use in the other working 
places. Here too, the employees were trained, the hell men ” 
and the purgatory men,” to be sent afterwards to the other 
stations as pacemakers. They had to be gradually acclima- 
tized to the mad speed and the heat. An untrained man 
would have broken down in the first hour in “ Hell.” Allan 
sought out every minute touch that gave even the slightest 
advantage in the expenditure of power, money and time. 
He reduced the division of labor to the extreme point, so 
that each worker, year in, year out, had to perform precisely 


THE WOEK GKOWS 


137 


the same duty, until he did his work automatically and more 
and more quickly in consequence. He had his specialists, 
who trained and drilled his battalions, till they made 

records’^ (as for instance in the unloading of a car) and 
these records ’’ were then taken as the normal standard of 
work to be accomplished. A second lost could never be re- 
gained, and it cost a fortune in time and money. If each 
man lost a second in the minute, with an army of 180,000 
men, of whom 60,000 were always at work, thaft meant a loss of 
24,000 working hours in a single day. From year to year 
Allan had succeeded in raising the output of work five per 
cent. And in spite of all this it was going on too slowly. 

Besides this the situation at the head of the excavations 
gave Allan great anxiety. It was absolutely impossible to 
crowd more men into the last five hundred yards, unless 
they were to be knocking against each others’ knees. He 
experimented with various blasting materials until he found 
one — Tunnel explosive, No. 8 ” — ^which broke up the rock 
into fairly regular blocks that it was easy to get away. He 
listened for hours to the suggestions of his engineers ; without 
a sign of weariness he discussed their proposals, and tested 
and proved them. All unexpected, as if he had come up out 
of the sea, he made his appearance at Bermuda. Schlosser 
was sent back to the construction office at Mac City. A young 
Englishman, J ohn Farbey, hardly thirty years of age, took his 
place. Allan called together the engineers who were already 
almost breathless with the speed of the work, and told them 
they must accelerate it by 25 per cent. They must. For he 
— Allan — would have to be up to time. How it was to be 
done was their business. . . . 

Then unexpectedly he made his appearance at the Azores. 
He had succeeded in engaging for this working center a 
German, Michael Muller, who had for some years held a high 
post under the constructors of the Channel Tunnel. Muller 
weighed two hundred and forty pounds, and was generally 
known by the name of fat Muller.” He was liked by his 
men — ^partly because his stoutness gave some suggestion of 
the comic — and he was an indefatigable worker. Presently 


138 


THE TUNNEL 


Muller was driving his borings forward even more quickly than 
Allan and Harriman were doing at New Jersey. Muller, 
this smiling, talkative mass of fat, seemed to be followed 
everywhere by good fortune. His galleries and borings proved 
to be the most interesting from a geological point of view 
and the most productive, and gave abundant proof that at 
an earlier period this part of the ocean bed bad been dry 
land. He hit upon a great hot-ash deposit, and on iron ores. 
The Pittsburg Smelting and Kefining Company, which had in 
good time secured the mining rights for all materials sent up 
from the workings, thanked its good fortune. Its shares went 
up 60 per cent. The actual bringing out of the ore did not 
cost it a cent. Its engineers had simply to indicate the re- 
quired number of freight-cars and these were placed in posi- 
tion for their load. And daily, hourly, there was a quiver of 
excitement at the chance of untold treasures offering them- 
selves for the taking. In the last month Muller had hit upon 
a seam of coal five yards thick — “ splendid coal,” as he said. 
And that was not all. This coal bed lay directly in the axis of 
the boring, and there seemed to be no end of it. Muller was 
driving right through a mine. His only enemy, his everlast- 
ing enemy, was the water. His tunneling was now eight 
hundred yards under the sea bed, and yet the water reached 
it. Muller had a battery of “ Mammoth Turbine Pumps ” in- 
stalled, that continually forced a river of dark colored water 
into the sea. 

Allan made his appearance at Finisterra and Biscaya, and 
here as at Bermuda, he declared that he must keep his word 
as to time, and therefore required accelerated work. In 
spite of the outcry that arose in the French press, he dismissed 
the chief engineer. Monsieur Gaillard, a white-haired, polished 
Frenchman, of great ability, and put in his place an Amer- 
ican, Stephen Olin Muhlenberg. 

As if he had sprung out of the earth, Allan arrived at the 
various power stations. Nothing escaped his attention, how- 
ever trifling it might seem, and the engineers breathed again 
when he took his departure. 

Then Allan made his appearance in Paris, and the news- 


THE WOEK GEOWS 


139 


papers broke out into columns of articles about him and long 
drawn interviews. Eight days later it became known that a 
Erench Company had secured a concession for the construc- 
tion of an express railway line — Paris-Biscaya — so that by this 
means all the Tunnel trains would be able to run direct into 
Paris. At the same time all the great cities of Europe were 
deluged with posters, showing one of Hobby^s magic cities, 
the future Tunnel station of ^^Azora.” Hobby’s fairy city, 
like his proposed city at the American terminus, caused on 
the one hand much shaking of heads, and on the other 
just as much excitement. Hobby had once more given free 
play to his fancy. The Syndicate had bought a tract of land 
in the island of San Jorge, some small islets close by, and a 
group of sand banks. But in a few years the extent of the 
ground would be increased fourfold. The islands would be 
joined together by huge, wide embankments, and the sand 
banks raised to the same level by pouring debris upon them. 
At first men could not realize that at this building site Allan 
could tumble into the sea 4,000 cubic kilometers of rock (and 
more if he wished) and thus build up this wonderfully con- 
structed island. 

As at the projected American city, so also at the future 
Azora, there was to be a vast and splendid harbor, with its 
breakwaters, quays and lighthouses. And besides this there 
was shown the seaside pleasure resort, with its hotels, terraces 
and parks and a plage looking out on the ocean. 

But the greatest wonder of all was excited by the prices 
named by the Tunnel Syndicate for sites in its projected city. 
They were, from the European point of view, simply exor- 
bitant. But the Syndicate had calmly and relentlessly fixed 
its gaze upon the European market for capital, as a snake 
fixes its eyes upon a bird. It was easy to see that Azora 
would attract the whole of the wealthy tourist traffic of South 
America. And it did not need much thought to understand 
that Azora, which could be reached in fourteen hours from 
Paris, and in sixteen from New York — ^would be certain to 
be the most famous seaside resort in the world, a rendezvous 
for the fashionable circles of England, France and America. 


140 


THE TUNNEL 


European capital came pouring in. Kings of speculators 
were formed to buy great stretches of land in the hope of 
selling them in small plots ten years hence at a big profit. 
From Paris, London, Liverpool, Berlin, Frankfort, Vienna, 
the gold came flowing in streams into Woolf’s coffers, into 
his ‘^big pocket,” to use the expression that had become 
proverbial among the public. 


VI 


SPEING TIDE 

Woolf swept into his ‘‘pocket” this gold, just as he had 
swept in the three thousand millions supplied by the capital- 
ists and the public, and the sums that came from Bermuda, 
Biscaya, Finisterra and Mac City. And he did it without re- 
turning any thanks. There had been in due time no lack of 
warnings of financial panics and crashes, as a result of such a 
huge stream of gold being diverted to one object. These proph- 
ecies of the dabblers in finance had been fulfilled only to 
the very slightest extent. A few manufacturing businesses 
were left stranded for want of resources, but in a short time 
they had pulled themselves together again. 

For Woolfs money did not stand idle. Not a cent was 
hoarded. It had hardly reached his hands, when it began 
again to circulate in the old way. 

He sent it all over the world. 

This spring tide of gold overflowed the Atlantic and went 
rolling over France, England, Germany, Sweden, Spain, Italy, 
Turkey, Eussia. It leaped over the Ural, and rolled on into 
the depths of the Siberian Forests and the Baikal Mountains. 
It flowed over South Africa, the Transvaal and Orangia; over 
Australia and New Zealand. It flowed into Minneapolis, 
Chicago and St. Louis; into the Eocky Mountains, Nevada 
and Alaska. 

Woolfs dollars were millions of fiery little warriors that 
fought with the gold of all nations and all races. They were 
all little Woolfs, filled to the neck with Woolfish instinct, and 
with “ Money ” for the watchword. They hurried in armies 
through the cables on the ocean bed, they flew through the 
air. And as soon as they reached the scene of action they 
were transformed. They changed into the little steel hammers 

141 


U2 


THE TUNNEL 


that clattered day and night in busy workshops ; they changed 
into the flying shuttles of weavers at Manchester; they sped 
here and there as Zulus over the sand bed of the South African 
diamond fields. They changed into the connecting shaft 
of some engine of a thousand horse power. They changed 
into some giant machine of polished steel, working furiously 
twenty-four hours each day, driven by steam and at times 
hidden in the steam clouds. They changed into a train-load of 
railroad sleepers on the way from Omsk to Peking; or into a 
ship’s hold full of grain bound from Odessa to Marseilles. 
In South Wales they turned into miner’s trucks eight hundred 
yards underground. They squatted on a thousand buildings 
all over the world, drawing mortgage interest from them. 
They were reaping wheat in Canada, and growing as tobacco 
plants in Sumatra. 

They fought for him. At a nod from Woolf they turned 
their backs on Sumatra and were stamping out gold in Nevada. 
They left Australia and flew away to alight in a swarm on the 
cotton market at Liverpool. 

Woolf gave them no rest. Day and night he hunted them 
through a hundred changes. He sat in the arm-chair in his 
office, smoked cigars, perspired, dictated at once a dozen 
telegrams and letters, with the telephone receiver at his ear, 
while at the same time he carried on a conversation with some 
stock-broker. He would listen with the right ear to the 
voice in the instrument, while with the left he heard the 
report of a clerk. He spoke in one voice to the clerk and 
then with another shouted into the telephone. With one 
eye he watched his shorthand writer or typist to see if they 
were ready for further dictation, while he kept the other eye 
on the clock. In the same second he thought of Nelly, who 
would by this time have been waiting for him twenty minutes, 
and would pull a long face when he arrived late for dinner; 
thought that the broker in the matter of the Rand Mines was 
an idiot, but had been far seeing in the case of Gamier Freres ; 
thought — in the background of his hairy perspiring skull — 
of the great battle he would fight and win to-morrow on the 
Vienna bourse. 


SPRING TIDE 


143 


Each week he had to provide a million and a half of dollars 
for various payments, and each quarter hundreds of millions 
for interest and sinking funds. At these times he would not 
leave his office all day long. Eor the battle was then in full 
swing, and Woolf purchased the victory at much loss of 
perspiration, fat, and breath. 

He would call his Army Corps back. And they came, many 
a dollar a little heroic victor, who had secured some booty — 
eight cents, or ten, or even twenty. Many came back crippled, 
and some had fallen on the field of fight — ^but that was war ! 

Eor years Woolf had been carrying on this breathless, furi- 
ous struggle, day and night, in days of stress, in times of suc- 
cess, with here an advance, there a retreat. Hourly he gave 
his orders to his lieutenants in the five continents, and hourly 
he examined their reports from the scene of operations. 

Woolf had a genius for money. He could smell it a league 
away. He had sent over untold thousands of shares and 
bonds to Europe, for in his opinion the American money was 
safer there in case he had to call up his reserve army of gold 
for active service. He had drawn up prospectuses that read 
like poems by Walt Whitman. At the annual general meet- 
tings he went straight to his point, and the Syndicate had in 
the course of years raised his salary to three hundred thousand 
dollars. He was indispensable. 

Woolf worked till his lungs were panting. Every piece 
of paper that he took in his hands showed the greasy mark 
of his thumb, though he washed his hands a dozen times a 
day. Despite all his wearing energy, he grew fatter and 
fatter. But after he had put his perspiring head under a 
stream of cold water, brushed his hair and beard, put on a 
fresh collar and left his office, he looked like a dignified gentle- 
man without a trace of hurry and haste about him. With a 
thoughtful air he took his seat in his elegant black enameled 
car, with its silver dragon that hooted like the fog-horn of an 
ocean liner, and rolled down Broadway to enjoy himself for 
the evening. 

He usually dined with one of his lady friends. He liked to 
dine well, and drink a bottle of good expensive wine. 


144 


THE TUNNEL 


Each evening at eleven he went to his club to play for a 
couple of hours. He played a careful game, not too high and 
not too low, silently, and at times pulling at his black beard 
with his red puffy lips. 

Twice every year he made his way to Szentes on a visit 
to his old father. Many telegrams came in advance heralding 
his arrival. All Szentes was in excitement. The famous son 
of old Wolff sohn! The fortune maker! What a head he 
had! 

Woolf had built a pretty house and laid out a beautiful 
garden for his father. Musicians came and played and danced 
there during his visit while all Szentes crowded up against 
the garden railings. 

Old Wolffsohn, with his thin face and shaking head, bent 
himself this way and that, saying with tears in his eyes : 

Thou hast become a great man, my son ! Who would 
have thought it? Great is my pride! I thank God each 
day ! 

And at Szentes Woolf made himself popular by his kindly 
ways. He talked with high and low, young and old, with the 
same American and democratic simplicity. He was so great 
and yet so modest with it all 1 

Old Wolffsohn had only one wish to be fulfilled before God 
called him. 

‘‘ If I could only see him,” he would say, this Mr. Allan. 
What a man he is ! ” 

And Woolf would answer: ‘^You shall see him. If he 
comes again to Vienna or Berlin — and he is coming — I will 
wire to you. You go to his hotel, say you are my father, 
and he will be delighted to see you.” 

But old Wolffsohn would stretch out his thin aged hands 
and shake his head and cry out, “I shall never go to see 
him — ^this Mr. Allan. I would not dare to do it, or to speak 
before him. My feet would not bear me up.” 

Every time the parting was hard for both. Old Wolffsohn 
tottered with feeble feet for a few paces beside his son’s saloon 
carriage, and cried aloud, while the tears ran down Woolf’s 
cheeks. But as soon as he had closed the window and dried 


SPKING TIDE 


145 


his tears he was the old Woolf again, the Eabbinical side 
of his brain in absolute control of his being. 

Woolf had accomplished his set purpose. He was rich, 
famous, redoubtable. The Finance Ministers of great nations 
received him with respect. Apart from a touch of asthma he 
was in good health. His appetite and his power of endurance 
were remarkable. He could enjoy life, and he was a lucky 
man. His misfortune was that he had to analyze everything, 
and that he had time for reflection, in Pullman cars and in 
the deck chairs of steamers. All the men he had met in his 
life were sharply cinematographed in his memory. He had 
compared these men one with another, and himself with each 
and all. He was always self-critical. To his no small dis- 
may he discovered that he was quite an ordinary, everyday 
man. He knew the market, the markets of the world. He 
was like a stock exchange record, a bourse ticker — a man 
packed with flgures even under the nails of his toes — but 
what else was he? Was he after all one whom you could 
call a personality, a man with real individuality ? His father, 
who lived in an atmosphere two thousand years behind his own 
ideas, was, despite it all, more of an individuality than he 
was. He himself had become an Austrian, a German, an 
Englishman, an American. In all these changes he had lost 
something of himself, and — ^now what was he? Well, the 
devil only could say exactly what he was now. His memory, 
that abnormal memory, which a year afterwards still kept 
mechanically the very number of the railway car in which he 
had traveled from San Francisco to New York, that memory 
was like an ever wakeful conscience. It remembered where 
he had got that idea which he had brought out as something 
quite original and his own, where he had learned this trick 
of raising his hat, that way of speaking or smiling, that way 
of looking at some one who was boring him. As soon as he 
recognized all this, he understood how his instinct had led 
him to adopt the pose that was the safest ; reposeful, tactiturn 
dignity. And even this pose was pieced together out of a 
million elements that he had borrowed from other men ! 

He thought of Allan, Hobby, Lloyd, Harriman. They were 


146 


THE TUNNEL 


all men! Up to and including Llo5'd, he considered them all 
as narrow, as people who could only think within a defined 
compass, and in general did not think at all. But for all that 
they were men, original men, individual personalities. He 
thought of Allan’s strong character and influence. Wherein 
lay his strength? Who could say why he seemed a strong 
man? No one. His power, the kind of — well, terror, that he 
inspired? Where did it come from? No one could say. 
This Allan did not pose. He was always natural, simple, 
always himself, and yet there was this influence. He had 
often looked at Allan’s brown, freckled face. It expressed 
neither nobility nor genius, and yet he could never sate his 
gaze on the simple frankness of those features. When Allan 
said anything, even carelessly, that was enough. No one 
would think for a moment of neglecting his orders. 

With these reflections Woolf always came back to the same 
point — his relations with Allan. Allan was attentive to him, 
and dealt with him in an obliging, friendly way — but all the 
same he did not act towards him as he did towards the others, 
and Woolf was quite conscious of this difference. 

He heard Allan calling nearly all the engineers, heads of 
departments and employees, simply by their names. But why 
did he always address him as Mr. Woolf ” without ever, even 
by a slip of the tongue, being more familiar? Out of re- 
spect? Oh, no, my son, this Allan feels respect only for 
himself! Absurd as it seemed even to Woolf himself, it was 
one of his most secretly cherished wishes that Allan would 
some day give him a slap on the shoulder and say — Hallo, 
Woolf, how do you do?” But he had been waiting years 
for this. 

It was then that it became clear to Woolf that he hated 
Allan. Yes, he hated him — ^without any reason. He wished 
to see Allan’s self-assurance shattered; Allan’s glance grow 
unsteady ; Allan some day dependent on him. 

Woolf was all hot passion as he pondered. And after all 
it was quite possible. There might come a day when he, 
Woolf . . . ! Why should it not be possible that some day 
he might obtain absolute control over the Syndicate? 


SPEING TIDE 


147 


Woolf closed his black, gleaming eyes, and his fat cheeks 
quivered. 

This was the cleverest thought that had been framed in 
his mind in all his life, and it hypnotized him. He need only 
have a thousand million of shares at his back — and then 
Mac Allan would see what manner of man Woolf was I 
Woolf lighted a cigar and dreamed his dream. 


VII 


THE EPIC OF IEOH 

The Edison Biograph was doing splendid and steady business 
with its Tunnel Film, which had now developed into a new 
series of pictures each week. 

It showed the black smoke bank that always hung over the 
depot of materials and the railway station at Mac City. It 
showed the countless array of cars that were drawn thither 
by a thousand panting locomotives from every State in Amer- 
ica. It showed the freight stages, fixed cranes, traveling and 
gantry cranes. It showed purgatory and hell,^^ full of 
men madly working, while a phonograph echoed the din as 
it resounded through the galleries, six miles behind the work- 
ing face. Although taken through a muffled receiver, the 
noise was so overwhelming and terrible that the audience 
stopped their ears. 

And the audience, who ten minutes before had been enjoy- 
ing themselves over an awful melodrama, felt that all the 
varied smoke-enveloped and resounding pictures of toil which 
the screen displayed before them, were scenes in a far greater 
and more important drama. 

The Edison Biograph told the epic of iron, greater and 
mightier than all the epics of ancient days. 

Iron mines near Bilbao in the north of Spain, Gellivara, 
Grangesberg in Sweden. A mining town in Ohio, the air full 
of a rain of ashes, the chimneys rising like a forest of lances. 
Flaming blast furnaces in Sweden, with tongues of fire shoot- 
ing up all round the horizon by night — an inferno. Iron 
works in Westphalia. Palaces of glass with great machines 
invented by men, mammoths with their dwarf-like makers and 
guides standing beside them. A group of huge, demon-like 
things — the towering blast furnaces all ablaze, and girt with 

148 


THE EPIC OF IEOH 


149 


iron bands shooting out their flames into the sky. The iron 
bars go rushing up ; the furnace is receiving its charge. The 
poisonous gases go roaring through the shaft of the tower, 
heating the blast to a thousand degrees. As the furnace 
door opens a stream of iron shoots out into the foundry hall. 
The men are all aglow with deadly pale faces gleaming in 
the blinding glare. Then the huge crucibles for the Bessemer 
and Thomas processes, bulky masses revolving on an axis, 
high as the roof, now erect, now tilted side-long under the 
impulse of hydraulic rams, and belching out fiery serpents 
and jets of sparks as the blast drives through the molten 
steel. Then the Martin furnaces, the furnaces for the rolling- 
mills, the mills, the steam hammers, smoke, whirling sparks, 
men all aglow, and through every inch of the film genius and 
victory. A red hot sparkling block of iron runs down the 
track to the rolling mill and is caught between the rollers, 
it stretches out like a piece of wax, longer and longer. It 
is run back again through the last pair of rollers that give 
it shape, and there it lies hot and glowing, then cools down 
black, conquered and ready for its work, and the legend of 
the picture runs thus : " Krupp of Essen makes a rail for the 
Tunnel line/* 

Last of all a gallery in a coal mine. A horse’s head comes 
into sight, then the horse ; a young boy in knee boots is with 
it; a long train of coal trucks is being dragged along. The 
horse nods its head as it passes, and the boy, as he comes 
near, stops and grins at the audience with his sallow, grimy 
face. 

The lecturer speaks : Twenty years ago, Mac Allan, the 

constructor of the Tunnel, was a boy like that in a coal 
mine.” 

There is a mighty burst of applause! A rejoicing over 
the success of human strength and energy — each thinks of 
himself and his own hopes ! 

The Edison Biograph was showing the film every day in 
thirty thousand theaters. There was no obscure little town 
in Siberia or Peru where it was not to be seen. So it came 
to pass as a matter of course, that all the higher officials were 


150 


THE TUNNEL 


as well known to the world as Allan himself. Their names 
fixed themselves in the memory of the public like the names of 
Stephenson, Marconi, and Koch. 

Only Allan himself had not yet found time to go and see 
the Tunnel film, though the Edison Biograph Company had 
more than once tried to bring him to it almost by main force. 

For the Edison Biograph promised itself especially good 
results from a scene of which the title would be: M<ic Allan 
sees himself on the Edison Biograph/* 


VIII 


THE ETEKNAL TKIAHGLE 

Where is Mac? asked Hobby. 

Maud kept her chair from rocking for a moment. 

‘‘ Let me see ! ... In Montreal, Hobby.” 

It was evening, and they were sitting together on the 
verandah of the first fioor, looking out on the sea. The 
garden lay silent beneath them in the darkness. Maud and 
Hobby had played four sets of lawn tennis in the afternoon, 
and were now taking it easy after dinner. The house was 
dark and quiet. 

Hobby yawned. He was tired and sleepy. 

Maud, however, sat and rocked herself to and fro. Her 
eyes were moist. 

She glanced at Hobby. In his light-colored suit, with his 
very fair hair, he looked almost white in the darkness. Only 
his face and tie were dark. He looked like a photographic 
negative. Maud smiled, remembering a story which Hobby 
had told her during dinner about one of Woolfs so-called 
‘^nieces,” who had sued him because he had turned her out 
of the house. She fell to thinking of Hobby himself. He 
pleased her. Even his absurdities pleased her. They were 
the best of comrades and had no secrets from each other. 
Sometimes indeed he wanted to tell her things which she 
preferred not to hear and she had to beg him to desist. He 
and little Edith were almost as closely attached to each other 
as father and child. It often looked almost as though Hobby 
were indeed head of the household. 

Hobby might just as well have been my husband as Mac,” 
she reflected, and she felt herself becoming hot and the blood 
rushing to her face. 

At this moment Hobby laughed softly to himself. 

161 


152 


THE TUNNEL 


What are you laughing at. Hobby? ’’ 

Hobby stretched himself out and bis chair creaked. 

I was just wondering bow I am going to get through the 
next seven weeks ! ” 

Why, have you been losing at cards again ? ” 

Yes, six thousand dollars ! To Vanderstyfft. These rich 
beggars always win/^ 

Maud laughed. 

You have only got to say a word to Mac.’^ 

Yes, yes, yes 1 replied Hobby. That’s how things hap- 
pen when one’s a fool.” 

And both sank again into thought. Maud had a strange 
impulse suddenly, as she moved to and fro in her rocking 
chair, her eyes always on Hobby. Her heart was full of 
trouble and excitement. 

Frank,” she exclaimed, leaning forward towards him as 
he lay back with his eyes closed, Frank, how would things 
have been if I had married you ? ” 

Hobby opened his eyes, astonished. Her question, and her 
use of his Christian name, which he had not heard in this 
way for years, startled him. Her face too was dangerously 
near his. Her white hands were on the arm of his chair. 

‘^How can I answer that?” he replied nervously, trying 
to laugh. 

Maud’s eyes looked straight into him, glowing, as it seemed 
to him, with tenderness and affection. Her little face looked 
wan and white. 

‘^Why didn’t I marry you. Hobby?” 

Hobby held his breath. ‘^Because you were fonder of 
Mac,” he said at last. 

Maud nodded. Should we have been happy together, 
Frank, you and I ? ” 

Hobby’s agitation increased and he could not move from 
his seat without coming too near her. 

“ Wlio knows, Maud ? ” he smiled. 

^^Did you really love me, Frank, or were you only pre- 
tending ? ” 

I did really.” 


THE ETEKNAL TEIANGLE 


153 


you think yon would have been happy with me?’^ 

I think so/^ 

Maud nodded, and her eyebrows rose as she seemed to 
ponder the matter. ^^You do think so, Frank she whis- 
pered, her eyes full at once of joy and misery. 

Hobby could bear the situation no longer. What could 
induce Maud to bring back these old memories? He wanted 
to tell her that all this was nonsense. But he was weak. 

And we have been real good friends, haven’t we, Maud ? ” 
he said in as matter-of-fact tones as he could command. 

Maud nodded, almost imperceptibly. She continued to 
gaze into his eyes, and so they remained for some seconds. He 
made a slight movement — ^he felt he could not sit still any 
longer. Then — ^how came it about ? — their lips met. 

Maud drew back quickly. She gave a little stifled cry, 
stood up, remained motionless for a second, and then dis- 
appeared into the house. 

Hobby rose slowly from his wickerwork arm-chair and 
looked round him, with an embarrassed expression on his 
face. 

Then he pulled himself together. He pulled out his watch 
mechanically, and passed through the dark room on his way 
to the garden down below. 

Never again, my boy,” he said to himself. Maud shan’t 
see me again for a while.” 

He took down his hat, lit a cigarette with trembling Angers 
and left the house, excited, disturbed, yet with a feeling of 
happiness within him at the same time. 

“ How the devil did it happen ? ” he asked himself, sud- 
denly standing still to think. 

Meanwhile Maud sat crouched up in her dark room, her 
hands clasped, looking straight in front of her with terror- 
stricken eyes. Oh, the shame of it ! the shame of it. Oh 
Mac ! oh Mac ! ” she whispered. And she began to cry, 
silently and passionately. Never again would she be able to 
look Mac in the eyes, never again. She must tell him, she 
must go away from him. And Edith ? She had reason to be 
proud of her mother now I 


154 


THE TUNNEL 


She started up. Hobby was going. Should she call out to 
him to come back? Her face was burning and her hands 
moved convulsively. Oh, no I In God’s name, no! What 
had come over her? All day long she had been a prey to 
perilous thoughts. That evening she had not been able to 
take her eyes from Hobby’s face. She had wondered how 
she would feel if Hobby kissed her. 

Now he was gone, and she lay on her bed, weeping bitterly. 
Gradually she became calmer and she made up her mind 
to tell Mac everything. 

Next morning, when she went down to the sea to bathe 
with Edith, she still felt something weighing on her heart, 
even when not actually thinking of what had happened. 
Everything would come right, of course. And she felt that 
she had never loved Mac so intensely before. But he ought 
not to neglect her so . . . And those strange disquieting 
thoughts kept coming back. What really were her feelings 
for Hobby ? Did she really love him ? 

Hobby remained away for three days. He worked like 
a slave during the daytime and the evenings he spent in 
New York, playing billiards and drinking whisky. He bor- 
rowed four thousand dollars and lost every cent. 

On the fourth day Maud sent him a note, saying she counted 
on seeing him that evening. She had something to say to 
him. 

Hobby came. Maud blushed when she saw him, but she 
welcomed him laughingly. 

^^We shall never be so stupid again. Hobby!” she said. 

Do you hear ? Never ! Oh, I have been reproaching myself 
so ! It was my fault, not yours, you know. At first I thought 
I must confess to Mac, but now I have decided not to. Or 
do you think I ought to ? ” 

^‘You might sometime when there’s a good chance. Or 
if you like, I 

‘^No, no, not you. Hobby. Yes, when I get a chance I 
will confess. You are right. And now we are just old friends 
again the same as ever. Hobby ? ” 

^^All right,” Hobby replied, and thought how pretty her 


THE ETEENAL TEIAHGLE 


155 


liair looked and how sweet she looked then, blushing in 
her confusion, and how good and true she was — and that the 
kiss had cost him four thousand dollars! 

^^The racquets are there. Will you have a game?’^ 

So they were old friends again. But Maud could not 
always refrain from glancing at Hobby in a way that reminded 
him that they had a secret between them. 



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PAKT IV 


I 

^^THE SONG OF MAC’^ 

Mao Allan stood like a phantom goading on the work. 

The whole world watched, spellbound, the breathless rush 
beneath the sea-bottom. The newspapers had a standing 
headline which first drew all eyes, like the news from some 
scene of war. 

During the first few weeks of the seventh year, Allan was 
overtaken by misfortune. In the American galleries the great 
October catastrophe happened which was to jeopardize his 
work. 

Mining accidents and mishaps were a daily occurrence. 
Workmen were buried in collapsing rock, blown to pieces in 
blasting, or crushed out of human semblance by trains. Death 
made the Tunnel its home and hauled in the tunnel-man 
with little ceremony. Great masses of water had again and 
again burst into all the galleries. The pumps had been 
barely able to cope with them, and thousands of men ran 
the risk of drowning. These brave fellows sometimes stood 
up to their chest in water, which very often was hot, 
and gave off steam like geysers. True, in most cases the 
presence of great quantities of water could be ascertained 
beforehand, and the necessary steps could be taken. By 
the aid of specially designed appliances, resembling the trans- 
mitter apparatus of wireless telegraphy, electric waves were 
sent into the mine, on a method first suggested by Dr. Levy, 
of Gottingen, and as soon as quantities of water or ore 
deposits were met with, these waves were reflected and caused 
interferences with those in transmission. The boring 
machines had been again and again buried by falling earth, 

169 


160 


THE TUNNEL 


and these accidents were not unattended by loss of life. 
Whoever was unable to get away in the nick of time was 
crushed. Carbonic acid poisoning was quite common. The 
Tunnel had even given birth to a new disease, akin to one 
observed in workers in caissons, the caisson disease; the 
people called it the bends.^^ Allan had established a special 
sanatorium on the coast for these invalids. 

On the whole, however, the Tunnel had not in six years 
swallowed up more victims than other big engineering works. 
In all there had been 1,713 deaths, a comparatively low 
figure. 

But the tenth of October of the seventh year was Allan^s 
black day . . . 

It was Allan’s practice to hold, every year, in October, 
a general inspection of the American section of the work, 
which occupied several days. Among the engineers and em- 
ployees it was termed the ‘‘New Court.” On October the 
4th he inspected the “ City.” He visited the workmen’s 
houses, abattoirs, baths, and hospitals. He came to Maud’s 
convalescent home, and Maud was in a state of excitement 
all day long, and flushed crimson at the compliments he paid 
to her management. 

On the following day he entered the Tunnel with Hobby, 
Harriman and the engineer, Barmann. 

The Tunnel inspection lasted several days, because Allan 
checked every station, every engine, every siding, every cross- 
cut and every depot. As soon as one point was finished, 
they stopped a train by signal, swung on to a flat-car and went 
a little way further. 

The galleries were as dark as cellars. At times swarms of 
lights flashed by ; iron scaffoldings, with human bodies hang- 
ing in them; a red lamp would gleam, the bell of the train 
clang, and shadows dart to one side. 

The dark galleries were filled with the thunder of the trains 
flying by. They rattled and roared; piercing shrieks floated 
in the remote darkness. From somewhere a howling as of 
wolves came, a blowing and snorting as of a hippopotamus 
emerging from the water, then powerful, gruff voices were 


'^THE SONG OE MAC” 


161 


heard, as of Cyclops in furious strife. The noise was such 
that one could not hear oneself speak. Thirty miles behind 
the drilling machine blared like a gigantic ramVhorn blown 
by the powers of Hell. 

The news that Mac was in the Tunnel spread like wild- 
fire. Wherever he went — ^unrecognizable through dust and 
dirt, but yet at once recognized — the gangs began to sing 
“ the song of Mac ” ; 

“ Three cheers and a tiger for him! 

Take off your cap to Mac, 

Mac’s the man for us! 

Mac’s the boy to lick creation, 

Three cheers and a tiger for Mac ! ” 

On the truck carting away the rocks sat the men coming 
off shift, and the trains left an echo of song in the roar and 
thunder of the gallery. 

Mac was popular, and — so far as the fanatical hatred be- 
tween workmen and capital allowed — was a favorite among 
his men. He was one of themselves, made of the same stuff, 
though stronger a hundredfold. 

Mac ! they said, yes, Mac is a boy ! ” That was all, 
but it was the highest praise. 

In the Purgatory galleries electric riveting machines 
clanged and buzzed, like propellers under full steam, while 
the iron shrieked. Here too the people sang. The whites 
of the eyes looked out of the grimy faces, the mouths opened 
rhythmically, but not a sound was to be heard. 

The last eighteen miles of the advanced southern gallery 
had to be covered almost wholly on foot, or on slow running 
material trains. Here the gallery was a forest of rough 
posts, a scaffolding of beams, shaken by an inconceivable 
uproar, the fury of which one again and again forgot, and 
then awakened to new. The heat (118° F.) disrupted pillars 
and beams, although they were frequently watered, and the 
ventilation devices incessantly forced in fresh cooled air. The 
air was bad, used up, the foul air of a mine. 

. In a small cross-cut lay an oil-begrimed, half-naked body — > 


m 


THE TUNNEL 


a fitter, struck down by heart failure. There he lay with the 
work raging round him, and hurried feet stepped over him. 
They had not even closed his eyes. 

Then they reached Hell.” In the midst of the howling 
eddies of dust stood a small livid-hued Japanese, motionless 
as a statue, and gave the optical commands. Now red, now 
white, gleamed the cone of light of his reflector, and now and 
again he shot a ray of light of a grassy green into a swarming 
pack of men, so that they looked like corpses who still toiled. 

Here no one paid any heed to them. No greeting, no song 
— utterly exhausted people who labored half unconscious. 
Here indeed they had to keep an eye on each other, in order 
not to be struck down by a post wMch panting men dragged 
over the rubble, or by a block of stone which six pairs of 
brawny arms swimg on to a truck. 

The gallery here already lay very deep, five thousand yards 
below sea level. The glowing atmosphere filled with splintery 
dust seared the throat and lungs. Hobby yawned continu- 
ously, and Harriman’s eyes bulged out of his red face as 
though he were choking. AUan^s lungs, however, were used 
to air poor in oxygen. The thundering work, the swarms of 
men dashing to and fro, made him lively. Involuntarily his 
eyes assumed a commanding and triumphant expression. He 
emerged from his repose and taciturnity, flitted hither and 
thither, shouted, gesticulated, and his muscular back gleamed 
with perspiration. Harriman crept up to Allan with a sample 
of rock in his hand, and held it before his eyes. He then put 
his hands in front of his mouth and yelled into Allan^s ear : 
^^This is the unknown ore!” 

‘‘Ore?” piped Allan back in the same way. It was a 
rusty brown, amorphous rock, very easily broken. Geolog- 
ically, it was the first discovery during the construction of the 
Tunnel. The unknown ore, which had received the name of 
Submarinium, was rich in radium and the Smelting and Ee- 
fining Company was expecting every day to strike big deposits 
of it. Harriman yelled this into Allan’s ear. 

Allan laughed. “ It might suit them ! ” 

Out of the drilling machine came a red-haired man of 


^'THE SONG OF MAC” 


163 


enormous bony structure, with long gorilla-like arms. A 
pillar of dirt and oil, gray powder in a paste on bis sleepy 
eyelids. He looked like a rock trammer, but he was one of 
Allan^s chief engineers, an Irishman named O^Neil. His 
right arm was bleeding, and the blood mingled with the dirt 
into a black mass like cart grease. He continually spat dust 
and sneezed. A workman was playing a jet of water on him. 
O’Neil turned around and bent this way and that in the jet of 
water, entirely naked, and came up to Allan dripping. 

Allan pointed to his arm. 

The Irishman shook his head, and pressed the water out 
of his hair with his big hands. 

The gneiss is getting grayer and grayer ! ” he bellowed 
into Allan’s ear, ^‘grayer and harder. The red gneiss is 
child’s play compared to it. Every hour we are compelled to 
put new crowns on to the drill. And the heat, good Lord ! ” 

‘‘We shall soon be going up again ! ” 

O’Neil grinned. “In three years!” he yelled. 

“ Have you no water ahead ? ” 

“ No.” 

Suddenly they all grew green and of a ghastly lividness; 
the J apanese had directed his cone of light on to them. 

O’Neil at once pushed Allan on one side; the drilling ma- 
chine was coming back. 

Allan waited while three shifts came off, then he climbed 
on to a rock train and rode back with Harriman and Hobby. 
They dropped at once into an exhausted sleep. Allan awoke 
with the crude, cruel light of day piercing his eyes like a 
Jmife. 

The train stopped in front of the station building, and 
Mac City breathed again. The “youngest Court” was over, 
and it had been let off leniently. 

The engineers went into the bath room. Hobby lay in his 
basin as if asleep, and smoked a cigarette. Harriman, on 
the contrary, puffed and snorted like a hippopotamus. 

“ Coming along to breakfast. Hobby ? ” asked Allan. 
“ Maud will be awake by now. It is seven o’clock.” 

“I want to sleep,” answered Hobby, with a cigarette in 


164 


THE TUNNEL 


his mouth. To-night I have got to go in again. But I 
will come to supper without fail.” 

Sorry ; I shan’t be here then.” 

^^New York?” 

No, Buffalo. We are trying a new type of drill, invented 
by fat Muller.” 

Hobby was not very much interested in drills, and there- 
fore he turned the talk on to fat Muller. He laughed softly. 

Pendleton wrote me yesterday from Azora, Mac,” he said, 
sleepily. “1 hear Muller is a fearful drinker! Pendleton 
writes that he gives garden-parties and drinks them all under 
the table.” 

At this moment the little Japanese passed them, spick and 
span ; he already had the second shift behind him. He took 
off his hat politely. 

Hobby opened one eye. Good-moming, Jap ! ” he called 
out. 

That’s a smart fellow ! ” said Allan, when the J apanese 
closed the doors behind him. 

Twenty-four hours later the smart fellow was dead ! 


II 


THE GEEAT CATASTEOPHE 

OiT the following morning, a few minutes before four, the 
catastrophe happened. 

The place where the drilling machine of the advanced 
Southern gallery was grinding away the rock face on this 
unlucky 10th of October was just three hundred miles from 
the mouth of the Tunnel. Twenty miles behind it the 
machine of the parallel gallery was at work. 

The working face had just been formed. The reflector 
with which the little Japanese gave the orders flashed chalky 
white in the rolling rock, and the gangs of half-naked men 
who were forcing up the fuming dump heap. At this mo- 
ment an arm was thrown upwards, a second collapsed, a third 
sank down with startling suddenness. The fuming dump 
rolled forward with mad speed, swallowing bodies, heads, 
arms and legs like a whirling hurricane. The deafening noise 
of the work was swallowed in a dull growl, so terrific that the 
human ear could barely take it in. The head swam in a 
pressure which split the drums of the ears. The little J apa- 
nese suddenly sank under. It grew inky night. Hot one of 
all the Men of Hell had seen more than a tottering man, 
a grimacing mouth, a sinking post. Ho one had heard any- 
thing. The drilling machine, that ironclad made of steel, 
driven forward by the power of two express engines, was lifted 
off the rails like a tin toy, dashed against the wall, and 
smashed. Human bodies flew through the air like projectiles 
amid a hail of blocks of rock, the iron rock trucks were swept 
away, smashed to shreds and crumpled up into balls ; the for- 
est of pillars came smashing down and buried every living 
thing beneath the rock. 

This happened in a single second. A moment later all was 
165 


166 


THE TUNNEL 


as silent as death, save for the detonation of the explosion 
thundering in the distance. 

The explosion caused devastation along a distance of fifteen 
miles, and the Tunnel roared for sixty miles as though the 
ocean were thundering into the galleries. Behind the clangor, 
however, which rolled in the distance like a huge bronze 
ball, came stillness, a frightful stillness — then clouds of 
dust — and behind the dust, smoke; the Tunnel was on fire! 

Out of the smoke trains came headlong, hung with bunches 
of affrighted people, then unrecognizable specters came dash- 
ing along on foot in the darkness, and then nothing 
more. 

The catastrophe, unfortunately, happened just when the 
shift was being changed, and in the last mile or so about two 
thousand five hundred people were cooped up. More than 
half of them were hurled to destruction, torn to atoms, 
crushed and overwhelmed in an instant, and no one had heard 
a cry. 

But then, when the roar of the explosion resounded in the 
distance, the deathly silence of the gallery, immersed in inky 
darkness, was broken by despairing screams, by loud wail- 
ings, by maniacal laughter, by cries for help, curses, by 
bellowing and animal howls. Everywhere there was upheaval 
and commotion. Bowlders came pelting down, boards were 
split, and there was a slipping, sliding, and crunching. The 
darkness was appalling. The dust sank down like a dense 
rain of ashes. A beam shifted to one side, and a man crept 
panting out of a hole, sneezed, and cowered dazed on the 
dump heap. 

‘‘ Where are you? he shouted. In the name of God 1 ” 
Again and again, ceaselessly, he cried out the same thing 
and nothing answered him but wild cries and animal groans. 
The man shrieked louder and louder in fear and pajn, and 
his voice grew ever shriller until it was the voice of a mad- 
man. 

Suddenly, however, he grew silent. A gleam of fire fiick- 
ered in the darkness. A tongue of flame came licking out 
of the slit in the heap of fragments, and suddenly a swelling 


THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 


167 


sheaf of fire shot aloft. The man, a negro, gave a shriek, 
which died away into a groan of horror, for — merciful God I 
t — in the midst of the flame a man appeared! This man 
climbed up through the flame, a smoking bundle with a 
yellow Chinese face, a specter fearful to behold. He crept 
silently higher and higher, and then slipped down. At that 
moment a memory dawned in the distraught brain of the 
negro. He recognized the specter. 

Hobby I ” he yelled ; Hobby ! 

But Hobby heard nothing, answered nothing. He 
stumbled, fell on to his knees, beat the sparks out of his 
clothes, uttered a hoarse rattle, and gasped for air. Eor a 
time he cowered dazed on the ground, a dark mass in the lurid 
fire. He looked as though he would fall, but he only fell on 
both hands, and now began slowly and mechanically to creep 
forward, instinctively making his way towards the voice 
which shouted his name incessantly. Unexpectedly he 
stumbled against a dark figure and paused. The negro sat 
squatting there, his face streaming with blood, and continued 
to yell. 

They sat crouching opposite each other a while, and looked 
at each other. 

Come away ! Hobby stammered, and stood up auto- 
matically. 

The negro caught hold of him. 

Hobby he screamed, beside himself. Hobby, what 
has happened ? Hobby licked his lips and tried to think. 

Come away ! he then whispered again with a hoarse 
voice, still dazed. 

The negro clung to him and tried to stand up, but fell 
shrieking to the ground. My foot I he screamed. Great 
God in Heaven, what has happened to my foot ? ” 

Hobby was incapable of thinking. Quite instinctively he 
did what one does when a man falls. He tried to lift the 
negro up. But they both fell headlong. 

Hobby fell with his chin against a girder. The pain shook 
him up. In his dazed condition he felt as though he had been 
hit on the jaw, and, half unconscious, he set himself up for a 


168 


THE TUNNEL 


desperate defense. But then — ^then something remarkable 
happened to him. He saw no opponent, his hands had buried 
themselves in the- rubbish. Hobby came to himself. Sud- 
denly he knew that he was in the gallery, and that some- 
thing frightful must have happened ! He began to tremble ; 
all the muscles of his back, which had never moved so in all 
his life, twitched convulsively like the muscles of a terrified 
horse. 

Hobby understood. 

He half drew himself up, and saw that the drilling machine 
was burning. To his astonishment he saw heaps of naked 
and half-naked men lying on the rubbish in the dump in the 
most dreadful contortions, and none of them stirred. He saw 
that they lay everywhere, next to him and round about him. 
They lay with open mouths, stretched out at full length, with 
crushed heads, jammed between pillars, impaled, smashed to 
atoms. They lay covered with rubbish to the chin, curled up 
into a ball. It was a hideous chaos of stone blocks, girders, 
posts, and fragments of trucks inextricably mixed up with 
human heads, backs, boots, arms and hands ! Hobby shrank 
back in horror, he shook so that he had to hold fast to some- 
thing to prevent himself from falling. Now he understood 
those strange sounds which had filled the half-dark gallery 
far and near. That whining, whimpering, snorting and roar- 
ing of animals — those unimaginable sounds, never heard be- 
fore — they came from human beings! His skin, his face 
and his hands grew rigid as with cold, his feet were paralyzed. 
In his immediate vicinity lay, propped half upright, a man 
with the blood running out of the comer of his mouth as 
out of a well. The man no longer breathed, but he held his 
hollow hand under his mouth, and Hobby heard the blood 
splashing and running. It was the little Japanese, quite 
dead. Suddenly his hand sank down and his head dropped, 
till it stmck the hard substance beneath. 

Come away, come away ! ’’ whispered Hobby, distraught 
with horror. We must get away from here 1 

The negro gripped hold of Hobby’s belt and dragged after 
him with his uninjured foot as best he might. Thus they 


THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 


169 


crept together through the maze of pillars and corpses and 
rock, towards the screaming and animal sounds. 

‘‘Hobby!” groaned the negro, and sobbed with anguish 
and dread. “ Mister Hobby, the Lord bless your soul, don’t 
leave me, don’t leave me here! 0 Lord, mercy! I have 
a wife and two little children outside — don’t abandon a poor 
negro. 0 mercy ! ” 

The burning drilling machine cast glaring and malignant 
tongues of light and black flickering shadows into the dark 
chaos, and Hobby had to take care not to tread on limbs 
and heads projecting out of the stones. Suddenly, between 
two overturned iron trucks a form rose, a hand felt its way 
towards him, and he recoiled. Then he looked into a face 
which stared at him with vacant idiocy. 

“ What do you want ? ” asked Hobby, in a fright like the 
grip of death. 

“ Out of here ! ” screamed the face. 

“ Get away ! ” answered Hobby. “ That’s the wrong direc- 
tion ! ” 

The expression of his face did not change. Without any 
sound the form disappeared, as though swallowed up by the 
debris. 

Hobby’s head had grown clearer, and he tried to collect his 
thoughts. His burns smarted, his left arm was bleeding, but 
otherwise he was unhurt. He remembered that Allan had 
sent him to O’Neil with an order. Ten minutes before the 
explosion he had been speaking to O’Neil, next to the trucks. 
Then he had climbed into the drilling machine. Why, he no 
longer remembered. He had hardly stepped on the machine 
when he suddenly felt the ground rock under him. He 
looked into a pair of astonished eyes, then he saw nothing 
more. Thus far he knew all, but it was a riddle to him how 
he had got out of the drilling machine. Had the explosion 
dashed him out? 

While dragging the groaning and wailing negro behind him, 
he thought the position over. It did not seem to him to be 
hopeless. If he could reach the cross-cut in which the dead 
fitter lay yesterday, he was saved. There he would find lint 


170 


THE TUNNEL 


for bandages, oxygen apparatus, and emergency lamps. He 
clearly remembered that Allan had tested the lamps. The 
cross-drivage was on the left. But how far away? Three 
miles, five miles? That he did not know. If he did not 
succeed he must die of suffocation, because the smoke 
grew more intense every minute. Hobby crept onwards in de- 
spair. 

Then he heard close at hand a voice pant out his name. 
He stopped and listened, gasping. 

This way ! panted the voice. It’s me. O’Neil ! ” 

Yes, it was O’Neil, the big Irishman. He, whose bones 
usually occupied so much space, sat rammed together between 
posts, the right half of his face covered with blood ; he looked 
ashen, and his eyes were red, painful fires. 

‘‘I’m done for. Hobby!” panted O’Neil. “What has 
happened ? I am done for and am suffering torture ! Shoot 
me ! ” 

Hobby tried to shift a girder to one side. He gathered 
all his strength, but suddenly and inexplicably fell headlong 
to the ground. 

“It’s no good. Hobby,” continued O’Neil. “I am done 
for 1 Shoot me and save yourself.” 

Yes, O’Neil was done for. Hobby saw. He took the 
revolver out of the pocket. It lay in his hand as heavy as a 
hundred weight, and he could scarcely lift his arm. 

“ Shut your eyes, O’Neil I ” 

“Why should I?” O’Neil smiled a despairing smile. 
“ Tell Mac it wasn’t my fault — ^thanks. Hobby ! ” 

The smoke was acrid, but the burning fire grew feebler 
and feebler, so that Hobby hoped it would go out. Then 
there would be no further danger. But two short, violent de- 
tonations followed. “Those are the blasting cartridges,” 
he thought. 

At once it grew lighter. A big post was burning fiercely, 
and threw its light far through the gallery. Then Hobby saw 
some men, naked and begrimed, as yellow as saffron in the 
glare, wriggle their way out, and others slowly climb forward 
step by step. Moans and shrieks came from the rocks, hands 


THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 


171 


projected out and beckoned with cramped fingers, and here 
the ground would bulge up high, but the layer of stones al- 
ways sank down again. 

Hobby crept apathetically onwards. He was panting. The 
sweat dripped from his face, and soon he was half-uncon- 
scious through exertion. He paid no attention to the arm 
which projected out of the rubbish and tried to grip hold of 
his foot; heedlessly he climbed through a stream of blood 
pouring down from the ceiling. How much blood there was 
in a man, he thought, and took his way direct over a dead 
body lying on its stomach. 

The negro, whom fate had made his companion in this 
dreadful hour, wound his arms round his neck and howled 
and cried for pain and fear, and at times kissed his hair and 
implored him not to abandon him. 

‘^My name is Washington Jackson,” panted the negro, 
I come from Athens in Georgia and I married Amanda Bell 
from Danielsville. Three years ago I took on the Tunnel 
job, as a stone carrier. I have two children, six and five years 
old.” 

‘^Hold your jaw!” shouted Hobby. Don’t grip so 
tight.” 

‘^0, Mister Hobby,” cajoled Jackson, ^^you are good, 

people say so — 0, Mister Hobby and he kissed Hobby’s 

hair and ear. But suddenly, when Hobby hit him on his 
hands, mad fury overcame him; he thought Hobby wanted 
to shake him off. With all his strength he twisted his hands 
round Hobby’s neck and panted; You think you can leave 
me to die here like a dog. Hobby ! You think that I ” And 
he fell with a loud shriek to the ground, because Hobby had 
pressed his thumbs into his eyes. 

"'Hobby, Mister Hobby,” he implored plaintively, and 
cried and stretched out his hands, " don’t leave me ; by your 
mother, your good old mother 

Hobby was struggling for air. His breast contracted, he 
grew stiff, and the thought came that it was all over with 
Mm. 

" Come ! ” he said, when he got his breath again. " You 


172 


THE TUNNEL 


cursed devil! We must get througli under this train! If 
you throttle me again, I shall knock you down ! 

Hobby, good Mister Hobby ! And J ackson crept be- 
hind Hobby, whimpering and groaning, bolding with one 
band to Hobby’s belt. 

Hurry up, you idiot ! ” Hobby’s temples were near burst- 
ing. 

The gallery was almost completely destroyed' for a length 
of three miles, blocked up with pillars and rock. Everywhere 
figures were to be seen climbing, bloody, crushed, shrieking, 
whining and mute, panting forward with all possible speed. 
They climbed over trains of rock and material lifted from the 
rails, they crept over and under heaps of rubbish, and pressed 
their way between beams. The farther forward they got 
the more comrades they met, all of them hastening ahead. 
Here it was quite dark, and only a livid tongue of light 
writhed in now and again. The smoke pressed forward, 
pungent, and as soon as they smelt it they put on a desperate 
pace. 

They mounted brutally over the bodies of the crawling 
injured, they knocked each other down with their fists to win 
a single small space, and a colored man swung out his knife 
and blindly struck down every one who got in his way. In 
a narrow passage between an overturned wagon and a maze 
of posts a positive battle was raging. Eevolvers rang out, and 
the shrieks of those hit mingled with the howls of fury of 
those throttling each other. One after another disappeared 
through the fissure, and the wounded crept groaning after. 

Then the path grew clearer. Here there were fewer trains 
in the way, and the explosion had not demolished all the 
posts. But here it was entirely dark. Panting, gnashing 
their teeth, streaming with sweat and blood, the fugitives 
slipped and climbed forward. Forward ! Forward ! The 
fury of the instinct of self-preservation abated little by 
little, and gradually a feeling of comradeship awakened 
again. 

This way, this way the road is clear ! ” 

Can we pass along here ? ” 


THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 


m 


" On the right of the car ! ” 

Three hours after the catastrophe the first people from the 
destroyed wood gallery reached the parallel gallery. Here as 
well the wiring conveying the light was destroyed. It was 
black night, and all of them gave vent to a yell of fury. No 
train! No lamps! The men of the parallel gallery had 
long since fied and all trains were gone. 

The smoke came, and the mad race began anew. 

The squad slid, ran and dashed for an hour through the 
darkness. Then the first ones collapsed in exhaustion. 

is senseless !^^ they shouted. ^‘We cannot run three 
hundred miles ! 

What are we to do ? 

Wait till they fetch us ! 

“ Fetch us ? Who will come ? 

We shall die of huger ! 

Where are the depots ? 

Where are the emergency lamps 

‘^Yes, where are they?^^ 

«Mac !” 

Yes, wait for Mac ! ” 

And suddenly a lust for revenge awoke in them. ^^Wait 
for Mae ! When we get outside ! ” 

But the smoke came and at once they fled headlong, until 
again their knees bent beneath them. 

" Here is a station, hello ! 

The station was dark and deserted. The machines stood 
still. Every one had been driven away by the panic. 

The horde forced its way into the station. They were 
well acquainted with the stations. They knew that there 
were here sealed boxes with food, which only needed to be 
opened. 

There was creaking and cracking heard in the darkness. 
No one was really hungry, because hunger had been expelled 
by dread. But amid the supplies a wild instinct to fill 
their stomachs awoke in them, and they threw themselves 
like wolves on the boxes. They stuffed their pockets full 
of food. Not content with that, beside themselves with fear 


174 


THE TUNNEL 


and fury, they scattered bags of biscuits and dried meat, and 
smashed bottles by the hundred. 

“ Here are the lamps ! shouted a voice. 

They were emergency lamps with dry batteries, which only 
needed to be turned on. 

Stop, don’t turn on, I shall fire ! ” 

“Why not?” 

“There might be an explosion!” 

This thought alone was enough to freeze them. They grew 
quiet with fear. 

But the smoke came, and again the hunt began. 

Suddenly they heard shouting and shots. Light! They 
dashed through a cross-cut into the parallel gallery. And 
there they were still in time to see how, in the distance, crowds 
of men were fighting for a place on a car, with fists, knives, 
and revolvers. The train started off, and they threw them- 
selves in despair on the ground and shouted : “ Mac I Mac ! 
Wait till we come I ” 


Ill 


PANIC 

Panic swept through the Tunnel. It swept thirty thousand 
men through the Tunnel. The men in the uninjured galleries 
had stopped work at the moment of the explosion. 

‘^The sea is coming they shouted, and turned to fly. 
The engineers held them back with revolvers in their fists. 
When a cloud of dust blew in, however, and maddened people 
came dashing up, no threat could hold them back any longer. 

They swung up on the rock trains and scurried away. 

At a switching point a train ran ofi the rails, and the ten 
behind were suddenly held up. 

The hordes forced their way into the parallel gallery, and 
held up the trains here by standing between the rails and 
shouting. But the trains were already crammed to over- 
flowing, and there were bitter fights for a place. 

The panic was the greater because no one knew what had 
happened — ^they only knew that something very dreadful 
had occurred! The engineers tried to bring the people to 
reason, but when more and ever more trains full of demented 
people, shouting: ^‘The Tunnel is burning came rolling 
up — and when the smoke crept forward from the dark galler- 
ies, they too were seized by panic. All the trains moved out- 
wards. Those coming in with material and relief shifts were 
stopped by the wild screaming of the hordes of people racing 
by, and then likewise started to travel outwards. 

Thus it happened that two hours after the catastrophe 
the Tunnel was completely deserted for sixty miles. The 
machine men in the inner stations also fled, and the machines 
were at a standstill. Only here and there a couple of cour- 
ageous engineers had remained behind in the stations. 

Engineer Barmann defended the last train. 

175 


176 


THE TUNNEL 


It consisted of ten cars^ and stood in the finished part 
of the “ Purgatory/^ where the iron ribs were riveted, fifteen 
miles behind the point of the catastrophe. The light plant 
was destroyed here too. But Barmann had put up accumula- 
tor lamps, which fiashed into the smoke. 

Three thousand men had worked in the Purgatory,” 
about two thousand had already gone, and the last thousand 
Barmann wanted to convey in his train. 

They came pelting up in troops, and threw themselves mad 
with fright into the cars. More and still more came. 
Barmann waited patiently and doggedly, for many ‘‘ Flash- 
fire men ” had to cover three kilometers to reach the train. 

Start the engine ! Start ! ” 

We must wait for them ! ” shouted Barmann. No dirty 
business now ! I have six shots in my revolver ! ” 

Barmann was a gray little man, short-legged, a German, 
and stood no jokes. 

He went backward and forward along the train and stormed 
and cursed at the heads and fists which moved excitedly up 
above in the smoke. 

‘‘No dirty business, or you will all come out ! ” 

Barmann had his revolver in his hand ready to fire. 

At last, when the threats grew louder, he took up his post 
next to the driver of the leading engine, and threatened to 
shoot him down if he started without command. Every 
buffer, every chain of the train was full of people, and all 
were shouting : “ Start, start ! ” 

But Barmann still waited, although the smoke became un- 
endurable. 

Then a shot rang out and Barmann fell to the ground ; then 
the train started. 

Hordes of despairing people ran after it, mad with fury, 
finally coming to a stop breathless, gasping, foaming at the 
mouth. 

Then they started on the three hundred mile road, over 
sleepers and ballast. The farther the mass rolled onwards, 
the more threatening became the cry ; “ Mac, you^re a dead 
man!” 


PANIC 


177 


Behind them, however, far behind them, came still more, 
ever more, ever others. 

There began that dreadful run in the Tunnel, that run for 
life of which the newspapers were full later. 

The hordes became wilder and madder the longer they ran, 
they destroyed the depots and the machines, and even when 
they reached the section where the electric light was still burn- 
ing, their fury and dread did not decrease. And when rescue 
trains appeared, and there was no more danger whatever, 
they fought with knives and revolvers to get into them first. 

"^en the catastrophe happened deep down in the Tunnel, 
it was still night in Mac City. 

The place was feverishly astir and noisy as by day. To 
the horizon the earth was covered with ever-moving lava 
streams, from which sparks, fiashes of fire and vapors rose. 
Myriads of shimmering lights darted hither and thither, like 
infusoria in the microscope. The glass roofs of the engine 
sheds on the terraces of the cut gleamed like green eyes in 
a moonlit winter’s night. Whistles and hells rang out sharply, 
iron hammered and the earth trembled. 

The trains shot down and up as usual. The enormous 
machines, dynamos, pumps and ventilators worked and 
clanked as usual. 

It was cool, and the men coming out of the Tunnel, warm 
as a baker’s furnace, drew shivering together, and, as soon 
as the train stopped, with chattering teeth dashed into the 
canteen to get hot coffee or grog. Then they lumbered noisily 
into the electric cars, which conveyed them to their barracks 
and houses. 

A few minutes after four the first rumors of the disaster 
spread abroad. At a quarter past four Harriman was 
awakened and appeared, half asleep and almost dropping with 
fatigue, in the Central Office. 

Harriman was an energetic and resolute man, hardened in 
the battle-fields of labor. To-day, however, as luck would 
have it, he was in a wretched mood. He had worked all 
through the night. A telegram had reached him in the 
evening saying that his son, the only thing that had remained 


178 


THE TUNNEL 


to Mm in his life, had died of fever in China. He had suf- 
fered heavily and dreadfully, and finally had taken a double 
sleeping-draught in order to get to sleep. He was still asleep, 
as he telephoned into the Tunnel in order to learn more about 
the catastrophe. Nobody knew anything, and Harriman sat 
apathetic and unconcerned in his seat and slept with open eyes. 
At the same time it grew light in thousands of workmen's 
houses. Voices spoke and whispered in the streets, that af- 
frighted whisper which one hears so clearly in the deepest 
sleep. Women ran together. From north and south dark 
troops of women and men moved towards the gleaming glass 
roofs of the terraces leading to the Central Office. 

They assembled in front of the bare, high building, and 
began to shout, ‘^Harriman! We want to know what has 
happened ! 

A clerk with provocatively indifferent air appeared. 

We know nothing definite.^’ 

^^Get away! We don’t want a clerk! We want Harri- 
man ! — Harriman ! ” 

More and more people were collecting. From all sides the 
dark bundles came creeping up and combined with the multi- 
tude in front of the office building. 

Harriman at last appeared Mmself, pale, old, weary and 
drowsy, and hundreds of voices shouted at him the question, 
in all languages and tones : What has happened ? ” 

Harriman indicated by a sign that he wanted to speak, 
and the mob grew quite still. 

In the southern gallery an explosion has occurred at the 
drilling machine. We know nothing more.” Harriman was 
scarcely able to speak aloud. His tongue lay in Ms mouth 
like a metal clapper. 

A wild howl answered him. ‘‘Liar! Swindler! You 
won’t tell us ! ” 

Harriman felt the blood rise to his face, and his eyes bulged 
out of his head in anger; he tried to speak, but his brain 
would not work. He turned away, banging the door behind 
him. 

A stone flew through the air and smashed a pane in the 


PANIC 


179 


ground floor. A clerk was seen to scurry away in fright. 

Harriman ! Harriman ! 

Harriman again appeared in the doorway. He had washed 
in cold water and was now rather more awake. His face 
looked as red as a lobster under his grayish-white hair. 

^^What nonsense is this, smashing in the windows?^’ he 
shouted. ‘^We know nothing more than I said. Be sen- 
sible!^’ 

Voices shouted against each other. 

‘^We want to know how many are dead. Who has been 
killed? Names?” 

You are a pack of fools, you women I ” shouted Harriman 
in anger. How am I to know this already ? ” And Harri- 
man turned slowly about and went back into the house, a 
curse between his teeth. 

Harriman ! Harriman I ” 

The women pressed forward. 

Suddenly there was a hail of stones. For the People, which 
otherwise submits unthinkingly to Justice, at such moments 
creates its own laws from an innate sense of what is right, and 
carries them into instant execution on the spot. 

Harriman came out again, full of fury. But he said noth- 
ing. 

Show us the telegram ! ” 

Harriman stood still. Telegram? I have no telegram. 
I had a telephone report.” 

^^Out with it!” 

Harriman made no objection. Very good, you shall have 
it.” In a moment he came back with a slip from a telephone 
block in his hand and read it over aloud. In the far distance 
they heard the words, on which he laid stress: Drilling 

machine — south gallery — explosion in shooting — ^twenty to 
thirty dead and injured. — Hobby.” 

And Harriman handed the slip to those nearest him and 
went back into the house. 

In an instant the slip was torn into a hundred fragments, 
so many wanted to read it at once. The crowd grew quiet 
for some time. Twenty to thirty dead — certainly that was 


180 


THE TUNNEL 


frightful, but no great catastrophe. There was room for hope. 
It was not to be assumed that he should happen to have been 
working at the drilling machine. The greatest tranquilizing 
effect was produced by the knowledge that Hobby had sent 
the telephone report. 

Yet the women did not go home. Their old unrest came 
back, their eyes gleamed, their hearts beat. A weight lay 
upon them and they exchanged questioning glances. 

What if Harriman were lying ? 

They poured over to the station, where the trains were 
coming up, and waited trembling, freezing, muffled up in 
wraps and blankets. From the station the track could be 
seen down to the mouth of the Tunnel. The wet rails gleamed 
in the light of the arc lamps until they merged into thin lines. 
Eight below two gray holes yawned. A light appeared, 
flickered unsteadily, a beam shot out, and suddenly the 
blinding cyclops eye of a train was seen climbing up the 
track. 

The trains were still running quite regularly. At equal 
intervals the material trains ran down, and at unequal in- 
tervals, as usual, the rock trains came up, sometimes only one, 
often three, flve, ten behind each other, as they had done night 
and day for six years. It was the same picture as all of them 
had seen a thousand times. Yet they stared in growing sus- 
pense at the trains which came up. 

If they brought men, the arrivals were surrounded by a 
crowd which stormed them with questions. But they knew 
nothing, they had already been on the outward journey. 

It is inexplicable how the rumor could have circulated 
at the surface barely ten minutes after the catastrophe. The 
incautious word of an engineer, an involuntary call at the 
telephone — it had become known. Now, however, nothing 
was heard, nothing at all, the news was carefully guarded. 

Up to six o’clock the material trains and men went in 
regularly. 

At six o’clock the men in readiness were informed that a 
material train had run off the rails and the way flrst had 
to be cleared. However, they were to keep themselves in 


PANIC 


181 


readiness. At this the experienced fellows nodded and threw 
glances at each other. Good Lord ! Things look pretty 
bad inside there ! ” 

The women were ordered to clear out of the station. But 
they did not comply with the order. They stood immovable, 
held riveted by their instinct between a network of rails, 
and staring down the track. Larger and larger crowds joined 
the multitudes. Children, youths, workmen, and the merely 
curious. 

The Tunnel, however, still spat out rock without ceasing. * 

Suddenly the crowd observed that the material trains went 
in less frequently and a wild eddy of voices arose. Then no 
material trains at all went in, and the multitude grew still 
more uneasy. Nobody believed the fairy tale that a derailed 
train had blocked up the way. Every one knew that this 
happened daily and the trains dashed into the Tunnel in 
equal number. 

Now it was day. 

The newspapers of New York were already doing business 
with the catastrophe : The Ocean bursts into the Tunnel ! 

Ten thousand dead ! 

Cold and bright, day came over the sea. The electric 
lamps went out at a stroke. Only far out on the wharf, 
where suddenly the thick smoke of the steamer funnels be- 
came visible, the flashlight still revolved, as though they had 
forgotten to turn it off. After a time that too went out. The 
gleaming fairy town lay there looking suddenly fearfully gray 
and bare: with its cold network of rails, its ocean of trains, 
cabled masts and high houses here and there, over which gray 
clouds slowly drew. With the cold light, came an icy current 
of air and an icy drizzle. The women sent their children 
home to fetch coats, wraps and blankets. They themselves, 
however, did not shift from the spot. 

The rock trains which from now onwards came flying up, 
were all fllled with men. Even the material and workmen’s 
trains which had only gone into the Tunnel a short time 
before came back again. 

The excitement rose higher and higher. 


182 


THE TUNNEL 


But all the men who came out were in complete ignorance 
as to the extent of the catastrophe. They only started out 
because all those behind them came out. 

Once again the women stared, full of anxiety and dreadful 
fear, on the two little black holes down below which looked 
upward like two malignant eyes, with eaten-away sockets, out 
of which looked evil and horror itself. 

About nine o’clock the first train came on which man sat 
next to man, all gesticulating excitedly even before the train 
came to a stop. They came from the interior of the Tunnel 
where the panic had spread its first frights. They shrieked 
and howled : The Tunnel is burning ! ” 

An immense shout and howl arose. The multitude rolled 
hither and thither. 

Then Harriman appeared on a fiat-car, waved his hat and 
shouted. In the morning light he looked like a corpse, livid 
and bloodless, and every one attributed his appearance to the 
accident. 

Harriman ! Keep quiet, he wants to speak ! ” 

I swear I am speaking the truth,” shouted Harriman, 
when the multitude had quieted down, clouds of vapor pour- 
ing out of his mouth with each word. It is nonsense to say 
that the Tunnel is burning ! Concrete and iron cannot burn. 
Owing to the explosion a couple of posts behind the drilling 
machine caught fire, then the panic arose. Our engineers 
are already at work putting out the fire ! You need not ” 

But Harriman was not allowed to end. He was inter- 
rupted by wild whistling and shouts, and the women picked 
up stones. Harriman got down from the fiat-car and re- 
turned to the station. He sank powerless into a chair. 

He felt that all was lost and that no one but Allan could 
prevent a catastrophe here, up above. 

Yet Allan could not arrive before the evening ! 

The cold station room was filled with engineers, doctors 
and employees who had hurried up to be in readiness to render 
help. 

Harriman had drunk two pints of black coffee to counteract 


PANIC 


183 


tHe effects of the sleeping powder. He had overdosed himself 
and had fainted twice. 

What was he to do ? The only sensible thing he had heard 
was a message of Barmann’s, telephoned by an engineer in 
Barmann^s name from the sixteenth station. 

In Barmann’s view the posts in the timber galleries had 
caught fire themselves owing to the heat, and the fire had 
caused the explosion of the blasting cartridges. This was 
reasonable, but surely the detonation could not have been 
so violent as to be heard in the twelfth station. 

Harriman had sent in rescue trains but they had returned, 
as the outcoming trains were running on all four lines and 
forced them back. 

Harriman had telegraphed at half-past four to Allan, who 
received the telegram in the New York-Buff alo sleeping car. 
Allan had replied that he would hurry back by a special train. 
An explosion was out of the question because the explosives 
would only burn in fire. Moreover in the boring-machine 
itself the quantity of explosives was extremely small. Send 
rescue trains! Occupy all stations with engineers! Flood 
the burning gallery ! 

It was all very well for Allan to talk. It was utterly im- 
possible at the moment to send a single train into the Tunnel, 
although Harriman had immediately directed the regular 
shunting of the trains on to the up-lines leading out of the 
Tunnel. 

However, the lines got clear some time later and Harriman 
sent four rescue trains one after the other into the Tunnel. 

The mob gloomily let the trains pass. 

A few women gave vent to low abuse directed against the 
engineers. The excitement of the mob grew minute by 
minute. Then, at about ten o’clock, the first trains with 
workmen arrived out of the sweeping fire.” 

There was no longer any doubt now that the catastrophe 
was more frightful than any one could have imagined. 

More and more trains came up and now they brought men 
who shouted : Every soul in the last twenty miles is dead ! ” 


IV 


SUSPENSE 

The men with the grimy yellow faces who came out of the 
Tunnel were surrounded and stormed with a thousand ques- 
tions which they could not answer. A hundred times they 
had to tell what they knew of the accident, although what 
little they knew could be told in a dozen words. Women who 
found their husbands threw themselves on their necks. The 
others wept quietly, ran hither and thither, shouted and 
uttered curses, then stood still and stared down at the Tunnel 
mouth, until impelled again to vent their anguish in move- 
ment. 

There was still hope; for the statement that every soul 
in the last twenty miles was dead” had already proved an 
exaggeration. 

Finally, that train arrived the departure of which the 
engineer Barmann had prevented until he was shot down. It 
brought the first dead man, an Italian, who, indeed, had not 
lost his life in the catastrophe, but had engaged in a desperate 
knife afiray with a countryman, an amico, about a seat on a 
car, and had cut the other man down. His abdomen had 
been slit open by his amico as the latter fell, and he died on 
the way out. Still, he was the first dead man. The photogra- 
pher of the Biograph Company turned the handle of his ap- 
paratus. 

When the dead man was carried into the station beneath, 
the fury of the multitude fiared up. And suddenly all of 
them shouted out, just like the people in the Tunnel: 

Where is Mac ? Mac must pay ! ” An hysterically scream- 
ing woman forced her way through the others and ran to the 
dead man, tearing out her hair in handfuls and rending her 
clothes. 


184 


SUSPENSE 


185 


‘^Cesare! Cesare — Yes, it was Cesare. 

But when the excited hordes of workmen of Barmann’s 
train (mostly Italians and negroes) declared that no more 
trains were coming, the crowd grew quite still. 

No more trains ? 

We are the last ! 

^^What are you?^’ 

The last ! ! We are the last ! ” 

It was as though a hail of shells had been dropped into the 
crowd. They dashed hither and thither, senseless, beside 
themselves, their hands to their temples. 

The last ! You are the last ! ! ” 

Women fell to the ground and wailed, children cried; in 
others, however, the lust of vengeance flamed up at once. 
And suddenly the whole enormous multitude began to move. 

A swarthy, angular Pole climbed on to a block of stone and 
shouted : Mac has got us in a trap — a trap ! Eevenge for 

our comrades ! 

The crowd raved. Suddenly in every hand there was a 
stone, the weapon of the people, and there were stones here in 
plenty. 

Within the next three seconds not a window of the station 
building was whole. 

Out with Harriman ! ” 

But Harriman did not show himself again. He had tele- 
phoned for the militia because the few policemen of the 
Tunnel city were powerless. Now he sat pale and gasping 
in a comer, quite unable to think. 

Imprecations against him fllled the air and the crowd made 
as if it would take the building by storm. But the Pole had 
another proposal to make. The engineers should all die as 
well. Their houses should be burnt down over their heads, 
and their wives and children in them. 

^‘We will do for the lot!^’ shouted the Italian woman 
whose husband had been stabbed. The whole lot ! Ee- 
venge for Cesare ! And she ran in front, a fury in tatters 
with disheveled hair. 

The multitude poured over the dump fleld into the gray 


186 


THE TUNNEL 


rain. Their husbands, their breadwinners and fathers dead. 
Eevenge ! Amid the noise snatches of song were heard, and 
gangs at various points sang at the same time the Marseillaise, 
the Internationale and the Union Hymn. ^^Dead, dead, 
thousands dead ! 

A blind fury of destruction, demolition and murder had 
flared up in the excited mass. Kails were torn up, telegraph 
poles mowed down and the watchmen’s houses swept away. 
The police were bombarded with blocks of stone and hissed. 
It seemed as though all had suddenly forgotten their pain in 
their fury. 

In front, however, stormed the wildest gangs; fanatical 
women grown wild beasts, rushing towards the villas and 
country houses of the engineers. 

During this time the desperate race beneath the ocean con- 
tinued. All whom the falling rock. Are and smoke had left 
alive ran incessantly forward away from the finger of death 
which sent its hot, pungent breath ahead. There were some 
wanderers inside there, who, with chattering teeth and hair on 
end, stumbled forward; couples, who shouted and cried; 
hordes who panted behind each other with whistling lungs; 
injured men and cripples who lay on the ground imploring 
mercy. Many stood bereft of their strength by the fear that 
no one could traverse this enormous distance on foot. Many 
gave it up. They laid themselves down to die. 

The rescue train sounded their bells to signal that they were 
coming. Within the darkness men dashed towards them 
sobbing with excitement at being saved, but when it began to 
go further into the Tunnel they were seized with fear, and 
jumped off to reach by foot the second train which, they 
were told, was waiting five miles away. 

The rescue train went ahead slowly. The demented men 
of the last trains had thrown out a good deal of stone in order 
to make room in the cars, so that the line first had to be 
cleared. And then came the smoke! It was pungent and 
biting; breathing because difficult. But the train continued 
ahead until the reflectors were no longer able to penetrate the 


SUSPENSE 


187 


walls of smoke. Engineers jumped from the train and, wear- 
ing smoke masks, ran forward into the choking gallery and 
swung bells. They did indeed succeed in inciting a small 
number of exhausted men who had long given up all hope to 
make a last effort and to cover the remaining mile to the train. 


V 


^‘LET MAC PAY!” 

Maud slept very late that day. She had taken the place of 
an absent nurse in the hospital and had gone to hed at two 
o’clock. When she woke up little Edith was already sitting 
up. They had no sooner begun to chatter than a servant en- 
tered and handed Maud a telegram. A great disaster had 
happened in the Tunnel, she said, with restless eyes. 

‘‘Why did you not bring the telegram before?” asked 
Maud somewhat angrily. 

“Master telegraphed me to let you have your sleep out.” 

The wire had been handed in by Allan on his way. It read : 
“ Catastrophe in Tunnel. Do not leave the house. Shall 
come about six to-night.” 

Maud grew pale. Hobby I she thought. Her first thought 
was for him. He had entered the Tunnel after supper ; merry 
and joking . . . 

“ What is the matter. Mammy ? ” 

“ An accident has happened in the Tunnel, Edith.” 

“Are many people dead?” asked the little girl, unthink- 
ingly. 

Maud did not answer. She looked straight before her. 
Had he been deep in the gallery at that time? 

Maud slipped on her bathing cloak and called up the cen- 
tral office. It was some time before she got through. They 
knew nothing or would know nothing. Hobby? No, there 
was no news of Mr. Hobby. 

She dressed quickly and again rang up the central office. 
At last she succeeded in speaking to Harriman, who gave her 
to understand that the catastrophe was greater than had been 
supposed. 

Maud grew more and more anxious. Now for the first time 
188 


''LET MAC PAY!” 


189 


she was struck by Mac’s remarkable instructions. "Do not 
leave the house!” Why? She did not understand Mac. 
She went over through the garden into the hospital and spoke 
in nervous whispers to the nurses on duty. Finally she 
returned to her room still more restless and excited. 

"Why should I not leave the house?” she thought. "It 
is not right of Mac to prohibit my going out 1 ” 

Again she tried to telephone, but unsuccessfully. 

Then she took a wrap. " I will see,” she said half aloud to 
herself. " Mac can say what he likes. Why should I remain 
at home? Just now too! The women will be anxious and 
need, some one to talk to them.” 

She put the wrap down again. She fetched Mac’s tele- 
gram from the bedroom and read it for the hundredth time. 

Why this order? Was the catastrophe so great? 

But in that very case it was impossible for her to remain 
behind! It was her duty to go and help the women and 
children. She grew angry with Mac. She wanted to know 
what had really happened. But still she hesitated to dis- 
regard his strange instructions. And somehow she felt a 
secret dread, she knew not why. At last she slipped on her 
yellow waterproof coat and hastily fastened a scarf over her 
hair. 

She went. 

At the door, however, she suddenly felt an inexplicable fore- 
boding that to-day, to-day above all times, she ought not to 
leave Edith alone. Oh, that wretched Mac, who had done 
all this with his stupid telegram ! 

She fetched Edith from the " School,” wrapped her in a 
cape and pulled down the hood over her fair hair. 

" I’ll be back in an hour’s time ! ” said Maud, and they went. 

The weather was wretchedly wet and dreary. 

In a few minutes they came in sight of the Tunnel city, 
with its offices, farms and forest of cable masts which lay 
gray and dreary in the rain and dirt. Maud was immediately 
struck by the fact that no rock trains were running! This 
was the first time for years ! But the chimneys continued as 
always to belch smoke. 


190 


THE TUNNEL 


Suddenly she stood still. 

Listen ! she said. Edith listened, looking up at her 
mother. 

A hubbub of voices came, wafted down the wind. Now they 
saw people, a gray thousand-headed throng in motion. In 
the dusk, however, it was impossible to say what direction they 
were taking. 

“Why are the people shouting asked Edith. 

“ They are uneasy on account of the accident, Edith. When 
the fathers of all the little children are in danger, the women 
of course are very anxious.” 

Edith nodded and after a while she said : “ I suppose it is 
a big accident, Mamma?” 

Maud shuddered. 

“ I believe it is,” she answered, lost in thought. “ It must 
be a big accident ! Let’s walk faster, Edith.” Maud put on 
a quicker pace, she wanted — indeed, what did she want ? She 
wanted to act . . . 

Suddenly she saw with some surprise that the people were 
coming nearer! The shouting grew louder. And she saw 
a telegraph pole sink down and disappear. The wires above 
her quivered. She paid no more attention to Edith’s ani- 
mated questions, but hurried forward quickly and excitedly. 
What were they doing? What had happened? Her head 
grew hot and for a moment she thought of turning and lock- 
ing herself up in the house as Mac had ordered her to 
do. 

But it seemed to her cowardly to flee from unhappy people 
from fear of seeing the misfortunes of others. Even though 
she might not be of great help she could certainly do some- 
thing. They all knew her, women and men, and used to 
greet her and do small services for her whenever she appeared ! 
And Mac ? What would Mac have done if he were here ? He 
would have gone to them, she thought. 

The throng drew near. 

“ Why are they shouting so ? ” asked Edith, who began to 
get frightened. “And what are they singing. Mamma?” 

In fact, they began to sing, a wild, howling song that 


''LET MAC PAY!” 


in 


grew louder as they approached. Shouts and cries emerged 
from it. It was a mob that was scattered over the gray dump 
field. Maud saw a gang demolish a small field locomotive 
with stones. 

" Mamma ? ” 

" What was that ? I ought not to have come out,” thought 
Maud and stood still in fright. It was too late now to go 
back. 

They had discovered her. Terror gripped her when she 
saw the front ranks stretch out wild arms towards her, sud- 
denly abandon their path, and run in her direction. She 
gained courage again when she saw that they were mostly 
women. 

She went to meet them, suddenly filled with unbounded 
compassion for these poor people. Oh, Heaven, something 
dreadful must have happened! 

The first troop of women came panting up. 

" What has happened ? ” cried Maud, and her concern was 
unfeigned. But she grew pale when she saw the faces of the 
women. Dripping with the rain, half dressed, with a wild 
fire burning in their eyes, they looked like maniacs. 

They did not answer her. The distorted mouths howled 
triumphant and shriU. 

" All are dead ! ” the voices shrieked to her in all tones 
and all languages. And suddenly a woman^s voice screamed : 
" That is Mac’s wife, strike her dead ! ” 

Maud saw — she did not believe her eyes — a ragged woman 
with tattered wrap and eyes asquint with fury pick up a stone. 
It whizzed through the air and brushed her arm. 

Instinctively she drew Edith to her, and stood upright. 

" What has Mac done to you ? ” she cried. Ho one answered 
her. 

A howl which sounded like a single cry went up. Stones 
whizzed suddenly through the air from all sides, and Maud 
shrank and trembled in every limb. She turned round, but 
they were everywhere, all at a distance of ten paces — she was 
giried round. In all the eyes which her wandering affrighted 
glance sought out there burnt the same glow of hate and mad- 


192 


THE TUNNEL 


ness. Maud began to pray, and a cold sweat broke out on her 
forehead. “ My God — ^my God — ^protect my child ! 

Incessantly the woman^s voice rang out like a shrill signal : 

Kill her ! Let Mac pay ! 

A stone block struck Edith on the bosom with such force 
that she staggered. 

Little Edith did not scream. Only her hand twitched 
in Maudes, and she looked up in fright at her mother with 
wondering eyes. - 

‘^Oh! Heaven, what are you doing Maud screamed, 
and she crouched down and threw her arms round Edith. 
Dread and despair made the tears burst from her eyes. 

Mac must pay ! 

Let Mac know how it feels ! ” 

If Maud had been cowardly, if she had thrown herself on 
her knees and stretched out her hands, perhaps, at the last 
moment, she would have been able to waken some human 
feeling in these raving people. But Maud, little sentimental 
Maud, suddenly grew courageous! She saw that Edith was 
bleeding from the mouth, and had gone deadly pale. The 
stones came in a hail, but she did not implore mercy. 

She drew herself up suddenly in fury, pulled her child to 
her, and shouted with gleaming eyes into all those faces 
filled with hate : You are beasts, you are scum, dirty scum ! 

If I had my revolver Vd shoot you like dogs! You beasts! 
You vile, cowardly beasts ! ” 

Then a stone flung with great force caught Maud on the 
temple, and without uttering a sound, with hands out- 
stretched, she dropped to the ground over Edith. 

A wild yell of triumph burst forth. Shouts, laughter, and 
the hubbub of cries: ‘‘Mac shall pay! Yes, he shall pay, 
he shall feel it in his own body — he caught them in the trap 
— ^thousands 

But not another stone was now thrown. The mad crowd 
suddenly moved onwards. “Let them lie, they will get up 
themselves ! Only the fanatical Italian woman bent over 
those lying on the ground, and spat at them. Now for the 
houses of the engineers! Onwards! They should all be 


^'LET MAC PAY!’’ 


193 


made to understand! But the fury had cooled down after 
the attack on Maud. All of them had the obtuse feeling that 
something had happened that was not right. Groups broke 
up and scattered over the field. Hundreds dropped behind 
quietly, and stumbled away across the rails. When the furi- 
ous band at the head, led by the Italian woman, reached the 
villas of the engineers, their numbers had so fallen off that 
a single policeman could have held them in check. 

It, too, gradually dispersed. 

Now once more misery and despair broke forth. Every- 
where women were running, weeping. They ran in the rain, 
in the wind, they stumbled and fell heavily. 

Cruelly, malignantly, impelled by a dark madness of the 
masses, all of them had gone away from Maud and Edith, and 
the two lay for a long time in the rain in the open dumping 
field, unobserved by any one. 

Then a little girl of twelve, with red stockings hanging 
down, ventured to them. She had seen them stone ‘‘ Mac’s 
wife.” She knew Maud, because the year before she had been 
many weeks in the hospital. She was prompted to come here 
by a purely human impulse. At a little distance she hesi- 
tated, and did not venture to approach closely. At some dis- 
tance stood a couple of women and men, who also did not dare 
come near. Finally, the girl went a little nearer, pale with 
dread, and then she heard a gentle movement. 

She drew back frightened, and suddenly began to run fast. 

The hospital lay seemingly dead and deserted in the pour- 
ing rain, and the girl did not venture to ring. Not until 
some one came out of the door, a nurse, did she walk up to 
the railing and say, pointing in the direction of the station: 
‘‘ They are lying over there.” 

Who are lying over there ? ” 

Mac’s wife and his little girl.” 

Down below in the gallery at that time they were still 
running. 


VI 


Oisr THE EACK 

On his arrival in Hew York, Allan learned by a telegram from 
Harriman that Maud and Ethel had been attacked by the 
mob. But no more than this. Harriman had neither the 
courage nor the cruelty to tell Allan the whole terrible truth 
— ^that Maud was dead, and that his child lay dying. 

Allan had reached Hew York in his motor in the evening 
twilight of this awful day. He was driving himself, as he 
always did when he traveled at exceptional speed. 

His car flew madly through the midst of the vast crowd 
of women, tunnelmen, journalists, and curious onlookers, who 
stood sheltered by their umbrellas around the station build- 
ings. Every one knew his heavy dust-colored car, and the 
note of his motor horn. 

In a moment the car was surrounded by an excited crowd. 

There is Mac ! they shouted. There he is ! Mac ! 
Mac!^’ 

But they suddenly became quite silent as Allan stood up. 
The halo that surrounded him — the halo of his career, his 
genius and his strength — had not yet been dimmed, and it 
inspired the crowd with something of awe and reverence. 
Indeed Allan had never seemed more worthy of such respect 
than in this hour when fate was breaking him. And yet just 
now, when they were running for their lives amid the smoke 
of the Tunnel, they had sworn to strike him down wherever 
they met him. 

‘^Out of the road there!” he shouted in a loud voice. 

There has been an accident, and we are all sorry for it. 
We shall save all that can be saved ! ” 

But now angry voices rang out from all sides. They were 
cries such as had been heard ever since the morning: ‘‘You 

194 


ON THE EACH 


195 


are responsible for it. . . . Thousands are dead. ... You 
caught them in a trap ! 

Allan stood still with his foot on the step of the car. 
Boldly, calmly, he faced the excited outcry. But suddenly — 
even as his lips opened to answer — he collapsed. A cry had 
reached his ears, the mocking outcry of an angry woman, 
which seemed to cut through him, and he heard the other 
voices no more. A cry like this hammered on his ears again 
and again, terribly and remorselessly : 

“ They have killed your wife and child . . 

Allan drew himself up, stretched himself, as if he were 
trying to see further, his head fell helplessly back on his 
broad shoulders, his darkening countenance became suddenly 
sallow, all the expression went out of his eyes, and on his 
face there was a look of horror. In every eye around him 
he read that this awful voice had told the truth. Every eye 
echoed back to him the terrible tidings. 

Then Allan lost all command of himself. Allan was a 
miner, a workman like all the rest, and his first feeling was 
not grief, but rage. 

He pushed the chauffeur aside, and let the car spring for- 
ward before he himself had yet taken his seat at the steering 
wheel. The car plunged into the midst of the crowd, who 
flung themselves out of its track with cries of terror. They 
gazed frantically after him, as he shot away into the darkness 
of the twilight and the rain. 

There came a clamor of mocking voices: ^^Now he is 
hard hit ! Now he knows what it’s like ! 

But there were a few who shook their heads and said : It 

was not right — a woman, a little child 

But the mad Italian woman called out, screaming with 
rage : I threw the first stone ! I ! I hit her on the head ! 

Yes, I did it!” 

‘^You should have killed him! Mac! Mac’s guilty! 
But his wife ? And she was good ! ” 

Keel Mac ! ” screamed the Italian woman, in the highest 
note of her bad English. Keel him ! Keel him as dead as 
a dog!” 


196 


THE TUNNEL 


The house looked lonely and deserted in the wretched twi- 
light. With one look at it, Allan knew enough. As he 
walked up the gravel walk of the garden, and heard the flints 
crackling under his feet, there came suddenly into his mind 
an experience he had years before when he was making the 
Bolivian Andes railway. He was sharing a hut with a friend, 
and his comrade had been shot by strikers. Allan, unaware 
of this, came back from his work, but, in some puzzling way, 
the mere sight of the hut in which his murdered friend lay 
had made an uncanny impression upon him. There was the 
same air about the house. 

In the entrance hall there was a smell of carbolic acid and 
ether. As he saw Edith^s little white fur mantle hanging up, 
a sudden darkness rose before his eyes, and he almost broke 
down. Then he heard a maidservant sobbing and calling 
out : The master ! The master ! and as he heard the 

sound of her lamentations and her helpless outcry, he pulled 
himself together again. He went into the half-darkened 
living-room, where the doctor came forward to meet 
him. 

Mr. Allan ...!'’ 

am prepared. Doctor,’^ said Allan half aloud, but in 
such a calm, ordinary voice that the doctor looked into his 
eyes with a wondering glance. And the child, too. Doc- 
tor 

I am afraid she cannot be saved. The lung is injured.'’ 

Allan gave a silent nod, and went towards the stairs. In 
imagination he thought of the little girl’s clear, ringing 
laughter echoing in that stairway. At the top a nursing 
sister stood by the door of Maud’s bedroom, and made a sign 
to Allan. 

He entered. A single candle was lighted in the room. 
Maud lay on the bed stretched out at full length, looking 
strangely flat, rigid, and waxen white. Her face was beauti- 
ful and peaceful, but it looked as if there lingered on her 
bloodless features a trace of questioning, a question put gently 
and humbly, and her pale half-opened lips seemed to show 
some slight astonishment. On the edges of her closed eyelids 


ON THE HACK 


197 


there was a reflection of moisture, as of a last tear flowing 
from them. Never in his life did Allan forget that glittering 
trace of a tear nnder his wife’s pale eyelids. He neither 
sobbed nor wept, hut sat dumbly beside her death-bed, and 
stared at Maud. An indescribable sensation had numbed his 
soul. He could think nothing out, but thoughts went hither 
and thither through his brain in colorless confusion, and he 
paid no attention to them. There she lay, his little lady. He 
had loved her, and married her for love. She came from a 
lowly condition, and he had shaped out a brilliant life for her. 
He had guarded her, and every day told her to be careful 
with the motor-car. He had always been anxious about her, 
without ever telling her so. He had often left her in these 
last years, when he was involved in work. But he had loved 
her none the less. His good, sweet little Maud. That was 
all that was left of her now. He cursed Fate. 

He took Maud’s hand, and looked at it with sunken, burn- 
ing eyes. It was cold, but that must be, for she was dead, 
and the coldness gave him no shock. He knew every line 
of that hand, every nail, every joint. Over the left temple 
they had drawn down her brown silky locks, but through 
the web of hair he could see a dark, ugly mark. There the 
stone had struck her, that stone which he had blasted from 
the rock thousands of yards beneath the sea. Cursed be men 
and himself ! Accursed be the Tunnel ! 

All unsuspecting, she had met this evil fate as it came 
upon her in blind rage that swept far beyond its track. Why 
had she not followed his warning advice, though it was in- 
tended to protect her only from insult ? 

He had never thought of this ! 

Allan thought how he himself had shot down two men at 
the storming of the Juan Alvarez Mine. He would have 
shot down hundreds without a thought, if it was a question 
of defending Maud. He would have followed her without a 
word into the depths of the sea; he would have defended 
her against a hundred thousand wild beasts, so long as he 
could move a finger. But he was not here. . . . 

These thoughts ran through his brain, now endearments. 


198 


THE TUNNEL 


now imprecations, but all tbe time he was not really think- 
ing. 

There was a timid knock at the door : Mr. Allan. . . P 

«Yes?^^ 

Mr. Allan . . . Edith. . . 

He stood up, and looked to see if the candle was firmly 
fixed in its stick, so that there might be no mishap. Then 
he went to the door, and as he stopped there, looked at Maud 
again. In spirit he seemed to see himself throwing himself 
upon the woman he loved, embracing her, sobbing, crying 
out, begging her pardon for every instant in which he had 
not made her happy — ^but, in reality, he was standing at the 
door and looking at her. 

Then he went out. 

On the way to the death-chamber of his little girl, he drew 
all his remaining strength up out of the depths of his heart. 
He forearmed himself, as he recalled in memory all the terri- 
ble moments of his life, all those unfortunates whom the 
dynamite had torn asunder, or fiying rock splinters had bored 
through, or that man whom the fly-wheel had caught up and 
smashed against the wall . . . and as he passed the threshold 
he thought : Eemember how you once picked Patterson’s legs 
out of the slack . . 

He came just in time to witness the last expiring breath 
of his little girl. Doctors, nurses, and servants were standing 
about the room, the women were crying, and even the doctors 
had tears in their eyes. 

But AUan stood dumb and dry-eyed: Think in hell’s 
name of how Patterson’s boots were cut off, think of it, and 
don’t break down before these people ! ” 

After an eternity a doctor went to the bed. One could hear 
his breathing. Allan thought the people would leave the 
room, but they all remained. 

Then he went to the bed, and stroked Edith’s hair. If he 
were alone he would have taken her little body in his arms, 
but he did not dare to do any more. 

He went out. 

As he walked down the stair it was as if suddenly there 


ON THE EACK 


199 


broke out above his head a loud wailing outcry, but in truth 
it was all stillness, except for a low sound of sobbing. 

Below he met a nurse. She stopped as she saw that he 
wished to say something to her. 

Who are you ? he said at last, with a great effort, 
am Nurse Eveline.^^ 

^^Nurse,^^ Allan went on, and his voice sounded strange, 
weak and hesitating, might I ask you to do me a service? 
I won’t — I cannot do it myself. I would like very much to 
keep some little locks of hair of my wife and child. Could 
you see to this for me? But no one must know of it. Will 
you promise me this ? ” 

‘^Yes, Mr. Allan.” She saw that his eyes were full of 
tears. 

‘‘ I shall be grateful to you all my life. Nurse.” 

In the dark parlor, a tall, slight woman was sitting in an 
armchair, sobbing quietly, and pressing her face into her 
handkerchief. As he passed she rose, stretched out her pale 
hands towards him, and whispered : Mac . . .” 

But he passed on, and it was only some days later that it 
occurred to him that the woman was Ethel Lloyd. 

Allan went into the garden below. It seemed to him to 
have become terribly cold, and he pulled his coat tightly 
round him. He walked up and down on the tennis ground, 
then pushed his way between dripping shrubs down to the sea. 

Allan glanced over the bushes, and looked at the gable of 
the house. There they lay. Then he glanced south-east- 
wards over the sea. There, beneath it, lay the others. Be- 
low there lay Hobby with fingers cramped together and neck 
bent as a suffocated man lies. 

It was growing colder every moment. An awful chill 
seemed to be coming in from the sea. Allan was freezing. 
His hand stiffened as if in the greatest cold of winter, and his 
face was set. But he saw quite plainly that the sand was 
nowhere frozen, though it crackled as if there were fine ice 
crystals under his tread. He walked up and down for an 
hour. Then he went back through the garden, and reached 
the road. 


200 


THE TUNNEL 


Andy, the chauffeur, had lit the lamps, for it was night 
now. 

Drive me to the station, Andy. Drive slowly ! said 
Allan, in a low faltering voice, as he took his seat in the car. 

Andy drew his sleeve across his face. There were tears 
on it. 

The walls of men stood as before on either side, for they 
were waiting for the return of the rescue parties. 

No one was shouting any longer. No one raised a hand. 
He had now become like one of themselves. He was bearing 
the same sorrow. The people made way for him as he drove 
through them and alighted. They had never seen a man 
look so pale. 


VII 


INTO THE PIT 

AUiAN walked into the cold board-room at the station as if 
it were a waiting-room. 

There was neither ceremony nor formality in the works 
department. No one thought of lifting a hat or disturbing 
himself in any way. But now the excited conversation became 
suddenly silent, and those, who, out of weariness, had flung 
themselves on the chairs, all rose to their feet. 

Harriman went to meet Allan with a look of dread upon 
his face. 

“ Allan ... ? he said, stammering like a drunken man. 

But Allan cut him short with a wave of his hand. Later, 
Harriman.^’ 

He had a cup of coffee brought from the refreshment-room, 
and as he gulped it down he listened to the reports of the 
engineers. 

He sat with head bent forward as if waiting for a spring, 
looked at no one, and hardly seemed to hear them. His 
features were as if hard set with cold, colorless, with lips 
that had turned blue and white at their edges. His eyelids, 
of a leaden gray, had fallen over his eyes, the right one, which 
at times quivered nervously, lower than the left. But his 
eyes had no longer a human look in them. They looked 
like bits of glass with an ugly glitter in them. Often too his 
unshaven cheeks quivered and his lips moved as if he were 
biting grains of something hard between his teeth. With 
each breath he drew, the nostrils widened, though the breath 
came soundlessly. 

It is quite certain, then, that Barmann was shot ? ” 

^^Yes.’^ 

^^And nothing has been heard of Hobby?” 

201 


202 


THE TUNNEL 


No. But he was seen going towards the working faee.^^ 

Allan nodded and opened his mouth as if he could not help 
a yawn — Go on.^^ 

Eor two hundred and sixty miles the Tunnel was all in 
order, and the machines in charge of the engineers were work- 
ing. Eobinson, who commanded the working parties, had 
telephoned that the smoke barred all progress beyond the 
two hundred and eightieth mile. He was coming back with 
one hundred and fifty-two rescued men. 

‘‘How many are dead?^^ 

“According to the working returns there must be about 
twenty-nine hundred.^’ A long deep silence. 

Allan’s blue lips quivered as if he were struggling against a 
convulsive outbreak of grief. He dropped his head lower, 
and eagerly gulped down the coffee. 

“ Allan,” said Harriman with a sob in his voice. 

But Allan gave him a quiet look of surprise and said, “ Go 
on!” 

Eobinson had further telephoned that Smith, who was at 
work at the station of the two hundred and seventieth mile, 
asserted that there must be an air pump working further on, 
but telephonic communication in that direction was inter- 
rupted. 

Allan looked up. “ Can it be Hobby he thought. But 
he dared not express this hope. 

When Allan went on to discuss what had happened in the 
daylight, Harriman did not play a brilliant part. Tired out, 
he sat there with his aching head supported on his hand, and 
without any expression in his swollen eyes. 

But when it came to the question of the outbreak and the 
destruction that followed, Allan turned with a sudden jerk 
to Harriman. 

“And where were you, Harriman?” he asked in cutting 
tones and full of contempt. 

Harriman pulled himself together and raised his heavy 
eyelids. 

“Believe me, Allan,” he replied, raising his voice in his 


INTO THE PIT 


203 


excitement, ^‘1 did all that could be done! I tried every- 
thing. But I couldn’t fire on them ! ” 

^^What do you say?” shouted Allan, and his voice was 
threatening. You should have flung yourself against them 
even if they had driven a couple of holes through your head. 
You had your fists at the worst — hadn’t you? And you 
could have fired on them too — ^yes, why the devil couldn’t you ? 
Your engineers were standing by you, and you had only to 
give them the order.” 

Harriman was purple in the face. His thick neck became 
swollen. What are you talking about, Allan ? ” he replied, 
indignantly. “ You didn’t see the people. You weren’t 
there.” 

I wasn’t, more’s the pity ! I thought I could depend on 
you. I deceived myself! You are getting old, Harriman! 
Old, I say ! I’ve no more use for you ! Go to hell ! ” 

Harriman stood up, leaning his red fists on the table. 

Yes. Go to hell ! ” Allan cried out once more in brutal 
anger. 

Harriman went white to the lips and stared in consternation 
into Allan’s eyes, those eyes that glared with merciless con- 
tempt and brute rage. Sir ! ” he gasped out, and drew 
himself up with the air of one resenting a deep insult. 

Then Allan too sprang to his feet and struck his fist on the 
table so that it resounded to the blow. Don’t expect any 
courtesies from me, Harriman,” he shouted out loudly. Get 
away with you ! ” And Allan pointed to the door. 

Harriman tottered as he went. His face had gone gray 
with shame. It came into his mind to tell Allan that his own 
son was dead, and through the whole forenoon of the day he 
had been struggling against the effects of a double dose of 
opium. But he said nothing. He went. 

He went down the steps like an old broken man, his eyes 
bent on the ground. 

‘^Harriman has run away! The Bull has run away!” 
said the people mockingly. But he did not hear them. 

After Harriman had gone Allan dealt with the cases of 


204 


THE TUNNEL 


five engineers who had abandoned their posts and joined 
the fugitives. He dismissed them on the spot. 

Next, he asked to speak with Robinson over the tele- 
phone. One of the clerks called up the stations and directed 
them to stop Robinson’s train. Meanwhile, Allan studied tke 
plan of the galleries where the damage had been done. It was 
so silent in the room that one could hear the rain drops coming 
in through the broken window panes. 

Ten minutes later, Robinson was at the apparatus. Allan 
carried on a long conversation with him. No news of Hobby ! 
Did Robinson think it possible that there were still men alive 
in the wrecked galleries? Well, it was not quite out of the 
question yet. 

Allan gave his orders. In a few minutes a train of three 
carriages, with doctors and engineers on board, flew down the 
incline and vanished into the Tunnel. 

Allan himself was in command, and the train dashed at 
such a mad speed through the echoing empty Tunnel, that 
his fellow travelers, though used to high speeds, were them- 
selves anxious. After a bare hour of running they met 
Robinson. His train was full of men. The people on the 
trucks, who had sworn vengeance against Allan, broke out 
into loud murmuring, and their faces darkened, as by the 
light of the lamps they recognized him in the gloom. 

Allan went on. At the next siding he shunted his train on 
to the line that Robinson had just run over, because he 
was surer of finding it clear, and he never slackened his mad 
speed until he found himself running into the smoke. 

Even here engineers were at work in the damaged stations. 
They had closed the steel screen doors, against which the 
smoke came rolling like mountains of piled up clouds. But, 
nevertheless, the stations were so full of smoke that to hold 
on there was only possible so long as the machines kept pump- 
ing fresh air in and sufficient oxygen apparatus were available. 
For the engineers, just as for Allan himself, the Tunnel was 
a work for which life and health were to be freely put at 
stake. 

In the station at the two hundred and seventieth mile 


INTO THE PIT 


205 


they found Smith, who was here keeping the machines at 
work with the help of two operatives. He repeated that there 
must be a ventilating pump still working further on in the 
Tunnel, and once more Allan thought of Hobby. If only, 
after all, fate would leave him at least his friend! 

He pushed on deeper into the gallery. But the train now 
could go forward only slowly, for the track was blocked with 
quantities of fallen stones. The smoke was so thick that 
the cone of rays from the electric headlight was thrown back 
as if from a wall. After half an hour the train was held up 
by coming upon a great heap of dead bodies. Allan got off, 
with a safety mask on his face, and pushed on into the mass 
of smoke. In a moment he had lost all sight even of the 
great headlight. 

It was perfectly silent all around him. Not a sound, only 
the low heating of the valve in the oxygen apparatus of the 
safety mask. Allan groaned. No one could hear him now. 
Groaning and grinding his teeth like some wounded wild 
beast, he plodded onwards, and at times he felt as if he 
must break down under the immense burden of his sor- 
row. 

At every few steps he came upon bodies of men. But when 
he turned his light upon them they were always dead, staring 
at him with fearfully distorted features. Hobby was not 
among them. 

Suddenly he heard a gasping sound, and held up his lamp. 
At the same moment a hand touched his arm and a stifled 
voice whispered Sauve ! " The man fell down in a heap 
just in front of him. He was a young fellow wearing only a 
pair of drawers. Allan took him up in his arms and carried 
him back to the train, and he remembered how once a man 
had in the same situation dragged him out of the dark gallery 
of a mine. The doctors soon brought the senseless man back 
to consciousness. He was Charles Eenard, a Canadian, and 
he told how there was one of the air conduits in there still in 
working order, and to this circumstance he owed his life. 
Had he noticed any other sign of life further on in the Tun- 
nel? 


206 THE TUNNEL 

The rescued man nodded. Yes/^ he said, sometimes I 
heard laughter.’’ 

Laughter ? ” They looked at each other in astonish- 
ment. 

Yes, laughter. Quite plainly.” 

Allan ordered by telephone trains and relief parties of 
workers. Then at once he pushed forward again. The train- 
bell was kept clanging. It was murderous work, and the 
smoke often drove them back for awhile. But about mid- 
day they had forced their way almost to the two hundred 
and eightieth mile, and here they suddenly heard a shrill 
far-off burst of laughter. It was a horrible sound. They 
hurried forward. The laughter could be heard more and 
more distinctly. It sounded wild and insane, such laughter 
as divers have at times heard from a submarine, after an 
accident when the crew are smothering. 

At last they reached one of the smaller stations and made 
their way into it. There they made out in the gloom two — 
three — four men dancing and waltzing amid awful destruction, 
and continually breaking out into bursts of shrill delirious 
laughter. The air came puflSng out of a ventilating conduit 
into the stations, and it was thus the wretches had remained 
alive. Close by them was an oxygen producing apparatus 
which they left untouched. 

But the poor creatures cried out in terror and huddled 
back as they suddenly saw the lights and the men with their 
masked faces. They all rushed away into a corner, where a 
dead man lay stretched out stiff, and whimpered out prayers 
in their agony of terror. They were Italians. 

Is there any one here who speaks Italian ? ” asked Allan. 

Take the masks off.” 

A doctor stepped forward, and struggling with a fit of 
coughing, spoke to the madmen. 

‘^What are they saying?” 

The doctor could hardly speak. 

If I understand aright, they believe they are in hell,” he 
said with an effort. 


INTO THE PIT 


207 


^^Well, in God’s name, tell them we’re come to take them 
to heaven,” cried Allan. 

The doctor spoke to them again and again, and at last 
they understood him. 

They wept, they knelt down, and stretched out their hands 
imploringly. But when any one approached them they began 
to rave again. They had to he seized and bound one by one. 
One of them died on the way out ; two were sent to an asylum ; 
but the fourth recovered quickly and was soon quite well again. 

Allan returned to Smith’s Station from this expedition 
almost unconscious. Would there never be an end to these 
horrors ? He sat there breathing quickly, and quite exhausted. 
He had now been six and thirty hours without sleep. 

But it was in vain that the doctors urged him to go away. 


VIII 


THE EECKONING 

The smoke was creeping nearer and nearer. Slowly, step by 
step like a conscious being that first feels its way before it 
moves onward. It came slipping along the walls of the cross 
passages and into the stations, it rolled along under the roofs 
and filled every atom of space. The mine ventilating pumps 
sucked it out, the compressor pumps forced millions of cubic 
yards of fresh air into the workings. And at last, at first 
almost imperceptibly, the smoke began to thin. 

Allan awoke and looked with smarting bloodshot eyes into 
the gray gloom. He did not know at first where he was. 
Right in front of him there lay a long bodied machine of 
bright steel and brass, with its mechanism working quite 
noiselessly. The fly wheel, so placed that it was half below 
the base level, seemed to be standing still. But as one looked 
longer at it one saw a play of light upon it, a gleam that went 
and came; it was making nine hundred revolutions each 
minute, but was so exactly adjusted that it gave the impres- 
sion of being at rest. Then all at once he realized where he 
was. He was still at Smith’s Station. A figure was moving 
in the haze of smoke. 

‘‘Is that you. Smith?” 

The figure came nearer and he recognized Robinson. . 

“ I have relieved Smith, Allan,” said Robinson, a tall thin 
American. 

“Have I slept long?” 

“No, only an hour.” 

“Where are the others?” 

Robinson reported that the others were trying to get the 
section quite clear. The smoke was breaking up and it was 
becoming more endurable. In the nineteenth station, at the 

208 


THE EECKONING 


209 


two hundred and eighty-sixth mile, seven men had been 
found alive. 

More and more men living! Did the awful Tunnel still 
hold yet more of them? 

And Eobinson further reported that in the nineteenth 
station an engineer named Strom was running the machine. 
He had rescued six men and all were well. The engineers 
had not yet succeeded in re-establishing telephonic communi- 
cation and speaking with the station. 

Is Hobby among them ? 

« Ho.^^ 

Allan looked at the ground, and after a pause he said: 

Who is this Strom ? 

Eobinson shrugged his shoulders. 

That is the curious part of it. Ho one knows him. He 
is no Tunnel-engineer.’^ 

Then Allan remembered that Strom was an electrical ex- 
pert, who had been employed at one of the power stations at 
the Bermudas. Later on the following facts came out: 
Strom had been merely visiting the Tunnel. At the time of 
the explosion he was in Barmann’s section of it, and had the 
nineteenth station about two miles behind him. He had 
visited this station an hour before, and as he did not feel 
much confidence in the men in charge of it he turned back 
at once. Strom was the only one who pushed further into 
the Tunnel, instead of taking to flight in the outward direc- 
tion. 

A couple of hours later Allan met him. Strom had been 
at work for forty-eight hours, but no one would have seen 
a trace of exhaustion in him. Allan was particularly struck 
by the careful way in which his hair was parted. Strom was 
not a big man, he was not broad across the chest. He was 
barely thirty years of age, a Eusso-German from the Baltic 
Provinces, with a thin expressionless face, dark little eyes, 
and a black pointed beard. 

Strom had taken six desperate and hopeless fugitives into 
his station. He had plugged the cracks in the entrance gates 
of it with engine waste soaked in oil, so that the atmosphere 


210 


THE TUNNED 


kept fairly endurable. He bad pumped a continual stream 
of water into the burning galleries. But he would only be 
able to keep at his post for three hours more ; then he would 
be thoroughly knocked out — and he knew it well enough. 

Prom this advanced station further progress could be made 
only on foot. At every step onwards they had to clamber 
over derailed and upset wagons, heaps of stone, broken posts 
and sleepers. Then there came a clear space and they pushed 
on quickly. 

Suddenly Allan stood still. 

" Listen ! ” he said, was not that a voice ? 

They stood and listened. They heard nothing. 

“ I heard a voice quite plainly ! repeated Allan. Listen. 
I will give a shout.^’ 

And, indeed, there came in answer to Allan’s shout — a 
thin, subdued tone, like a voice sounding far off in the 
night. 

There is some one in the gallery,” said Allan, all excite- 
ment. 

And now the others believed that they also heard a thin, 
far-off voice. 

Alternately shouting and listening, they searched the dark 
gallery. At last in a cross-cutting, through which a breeze 
from an air conduit was blowing like a hurricane, they came 
upon a gray-haired man, who was sitting on the ground with 
his head leaning against the wall. Near him lay a dead negro 
with his round mouth, full of white teeth, wide open. The 
gray-haired man gave a feeble smile. He looked as if he were 
a hundred years old, with his thin withered features, and the 
scanty hair that fluttered in the draught of air. His eyes 
were abnormally wide open, so that the white cornea was 
visible all round the pupils. He was so exhausted that he 
could not move. He could only smile. 

I was quite sure, Mac, that you’d come and save me ! ” 
he stammered in hardly intelligible words. 

Then Allan recognized him. 

Yes, it is really Hobby ! ” he cried in astonishment and 
delight, as he raised the gray-haired man to his feet. 


THE BECKONING 


211 


Hobby ! said the others incredulously, for they did not 
yet recognize him. 

Hobby asked Allan, hardly able to conceal his 

joy and emotion. 

Hobby made a languid movement of his head, I am all 
righV^ he stammered. Then he pointed to the dead negro 
and said : The nigger gave me a lot of trouble, but he died 
at last, in spite of all I could do.^’ 

In the hospital Hobby wavered for weeks between life and 
death, until his strong constitution pulled him through. But 
he was never again the Hobby of earlier days. 

His memory was destroyed, and he could never say how 
he got to that advanced cross gallery. This only was clear — 
that he had by him an oxygen generating apparatus and 
lamp that belonged to the little cross-cutting in which the 
dead engine-fitter had been laid the day before the catas- 
trophe. Besides, Jackson, the negro, had not been suffocated 
but had died of hunger and exhaustion. 

One by one the trains came out of the Tunnel; one by one 
they rushed into it. Inside battalions of engineers fought 
heroically with the smoke. The struggle was not without 
its dangers. Dozens became seriously ill with smoke poison- 
ing, and five died — three Americans, a Frenchman and a Japa- 
nese. 

But the army of mere laborers remained idle. They had 
given up all work. They stood in thousands in long ranks 
on the embankments and saw how Allan and his engineers 
pushed on the work. They stood without moving a hand. 
The great electric light dynamos, the ventilating machinery 
and the pumps were all worked by the engineers, who could 
hardly keep their eyes open for fatigue. And amongst the 
holiday-making crowds of workmen, there mingled numbers 
of curious onlookers, attracted by the atmosphere of horror. 
Each hour the trains poured out fresh crowds of these visitors. 
The Hoboken-Mac City Line was doing splendid business. 
It took two million dollars in a week. The Syndicate had 
at once raised the fares. The Tunnel Hotel was crowded 
with newspaper reporters. Thousands of motor-cars came 


212 


THE TUHHEL 


rolling througli the city of sidings, packed with ladies and 
gentlemen who wanted to have a look at the scene of the 
disaster. They gossiped and chattered, and brought well- 
filled luncheon baskets with them. But they stared in silent 
horror at the four pillars of smoke that rose continually above 
the glass roofs by the Tunnel mouth, curling up into the blue 
October sky. It was the smoke which the ventilating engines 
were sucking out of the galleries of the Tunnel. And yet to 
think that there were men in them ! For hours these curious 
visitors would wait, though as a matter of fact they saw 
nothing, for the dead bodies were brought out only at night. 
A strong smell of chloride of lime came from the station 
buildings. 

The task of clearing the Tunnel required many weeks. The 
work was heaviest in the burned-out galleries in the forward 
sections, where the Tunnel lining was of wood. Here progress 
could be made only step by step. And here the bodies of 
the dead lay in heaps. They were for the most part terribly 
disfigured, and it was sometimes difficult to decide whether 
one had before one the blackened remains of a wooden upright 
or the carbonized body of a man. They were everywhere. 
They lay under falls of debris ; they squatted behind blackened 
and burnt beams, grinning at their discoverers. Even the 
bravest were overcome by fear and horror in this awful cham- 
ber of the dead. 

Allan was ever at the front, working indefatigably. 

In the halls where the dead were laid out, and in the hospi- 
tals, there was a succession of those heart-rending scenes that 
follow every great disaster. Weeping men and women, half 
distraught with grief, sought for those who belonged to them, 
recognized them, shrieked and fainted. But most of the 
victims of the catastrophe could not be identified. 

The little crematorium outside Mac City was working day 
and night. Ministers of the various religions and sects had 
offered their services, and performed in turn the mournful 
ceremony. All through many nights it was lighted up as 
bright as day, and endless rows of wooden coffins were always 
standing in the halls of the dead. 


THE EECKONING 


213 , 


Around the shattered boring machine alone four hundred 
dead were found. In all the catastrophe had swept away 
the lives of two thousand, eight hundred and seventeen men. 

When the wreck of the boring machine was cleared away, 
a yawning cavity came into sight. The borers had suddenly 
broken into a great hollow cave. By the light of the electric 
projectors it was seen that the cave was about a hundred 
yards wide. It was not so high. A stone took five seconds 
to fall from roof to floor, which meant a height of about 
fifty yards. 

The cause of the catastrophe could not be fixed with cer- 
tainty. But the most weighty authorities were of opinion 
that this cavity had become filled with gases as the result of 
chemical decomposition, and these had forced their way into 
the working galleries and had been exploded by the blasting. 

Allan at once proceeded to explore the cave that was thus 
discovered. It was a chasm about a thousand yards long, and 
quite dry. Its floor and walls were composed of the hitherto 
unknown, incompact ore, which the geologists had named 

Submarinium,^’ and which contained a marked quantity of 
radium. 

The Tunnel galleries had been put into order again and the 
engineers made their regular rounds in them. 

But the work was at a standstill. 


IX 


THE STRIKE 

Allait published a proclamation to the workmen who were 
on strike. It gave them three days to decide whether they 
would resume work. If they did not they were dismissed. 

Huge meetings were held on the open spaces of Mac City. 
Seventy thousand men packed themselves together, and 
speeches were delivered simultaneously from ten cars serving 
as platforms. 

The same words rang out unceasingly through the damp 
October air; the Tunnel — ^the Tunnel — Mac — the catastrophe 
— three thousand men — the Syndicate — and again, the Tunnel 
' — the Tunnel . . . 

The Tunnel had devoured three thousand men, and inspired 
this army of workers with terror. How easily they themselves 
might have been burned up or smothered in its glowing depths 
— and how easily it might happen that there would be another 
such catastrophe, perhaps on a more awful scale! Death 
might come upon them in some yet more dreadful form. 
They all shuddered as they thought of the Hell.^’ A kind 
of infectious terror came upon them, which terror spread to 
the workings at the Azores, and Bermuda, and in Europe. 
There, too, work was at a standstill. 

The Syndicate had bought some of the leaders of the work- 
men, and pushed them to the front on the platforms. 

These bribed leaders spoke for the immediate resumption 
of work. "We are sixty thousand,^^ they shouted. "With 
the workers of the other stations and the auxiliary services, 
we are a hundred and eighty thousand! The winter is at 
our doors! Where are we to turn? We have wives and 
children. Who will give us food? We shall bring down the 

214 


THE STKIKE 


215 


wages rate of tlie whole labor market, and men will curse 
ns! 

Every one could see this. They referred to the enthusiasm 
with which the work had been taken in hand, to the good 
relations between the workers and the Syndicate, and the 
comparatively high wages. ‘^In the ^purgatory’ and the 
‘help many earned their five or six dollars a day, though 
anywhere else they would have been good only for shoe- 
polishing or street cleaning. Am I lying or not?’’ They 
pointed in the direction of the workers’ villages, and cried 
out, “Look at your houses, your gardens, your recreation 
grounds! You have baths and reading-rooms. Mac has 
made men of you, and your children are growing up clean 
and healthy. Go to New York or Chicago, and you will have 
a miserable time compared to this.” They insisted on the 
fact that in six years there had been no serious accident, 
and that the greatest precautions would be taken by the 
Syndicate to prevent a second catastrophe. 

There was nothing to be said against all this. But suddenly 
the terror came again upon them, and all the talk in the world 
could not do anything to get rid of it. Men shouted and 
hissed and threw stones at the speakers, and told them to 
their faces that they were bribed by the Syndicate. 

“No one shall ever again stir a hand for that accursed 
Tunnel 1 ” This was the line taken by the opposing speakers. 
“No one ! ” And a thunder of applause that could be heard 
a mile off expressed the general agreement with them. These 
speakers reckoned up all the dangers of the work. They 
dwelt upon all the victims the Tunnel had demanded even 
before the catastrophe. In round numbers 3,800 dead in six 
years! Was that nothing? Did no one think of those 3,800 
men who had been run over, blown to pieces, crushed to death ? 
They spoke of the “ bends ” from which hundreds had suffered 
for weeks, and many would suffer all their lives. 

“ We can see through Mac ! ” howled these speakers. (Some 
of them were bribed by steamship companies that wanted 
to defer the completion of the Tunnel as long as possible.) 
“ Mac is no friend of the workers ! Nonsense and lies ! Mac 


216 


THE TUNNEL 


is the executioner employed by the capitalists! the greatest 
executioner the world has ever seen ! Mac is a wolf in sheep’s 
clothing I He keeps 180,000 men busy. Every year he dumps 
20,000 broken-down men into his hellish hospitals, and then 
sends them to the devil, crippled for life! Whether they 
starve in the streets or rot in the asylums, it’s all one to Mac ! 
He has used up in these six years an immense mass of human 
material! What does it all come to? Let Mac find some 
other way of getting his men together ! Let him bring blacks 
from Africa as slaves for his ‘ hell ’ ! Let him buy convicts 
from the Government out of the jails and penitentiaries! 
Do you see the rows of cofl&ns over there? Placed cofiin to 
cofiin, there would be a mile and a half of them ! It is for 
you to decide ! ” 

A roar, a hurricane of cheers and howls — that was the 
answer ! 

All day long the storm of debate raged in Mac City, sway- 
ing this way and that. The same arguments — for and against 
— ^were repeated a thousand times. 

On the third day Allan himself spoke. 

In the morning he had been present at the cremation of 
the remains of Maud and Edith. He was still overpowered 
with grief and sorrow, yet he spoke for hours to thousands. 
The longer he spoke and the louder he shouted through the 
megaphone, the more he felt his old power, and his old faith 
in his enterprise coming back to him. 

His speech, which had been announced by huge placards, 
was repeated at the same time at various points of the open 
spaces in German, French, Italian, Spanish, Polish and 
Russian. It was distributed in hundreds of thousands of 
copies all over the world. At the same hour it was trumpeted 
out through the megaphones in seven languages to armies of 
workers at Bermuda, Azora, Finisterre and Biscaya. 

Allan was received in silence. As he made his way through 
the crowd, it opened out to give him room, and many even 
touched their caps. But not a cheer was to be heard, and 
a lane of icy silence, in which every word seemed frozen up, 
marked his path. As he appeared on the railroad car in the 


THE STEIKE 


217 


midst of the sea of heads — ^the same Mac they all knew, 
with whom each of them had some time spoken, whose hand 
each of them had clasped — when he appeared a great wave 
seemed to sweep over the ground, the mass of people swayed 
as in a storm, there was a convulsive movement of the vast 
army that pressed together as wedges are driven by hydraulic 
rams towards one central point; but there was no sound to 
be heard. 

Allan shouted through the megaphone. He trumpeted his 
arguments to the four points of the compass. ^^Here I 
stand to speak to you tunnelmen ! he began. I am Mac 
Allan, and you all know me! You have been yelling out 
that I killed three thousand men in the Tunnel ! That is a 
lie! Fate is stronger than a man. It was labor killed the 
three thousand! Labor kills hundreds every day all over 
the world ! Labor is a battle, and a battle means that men 
are killed! In New York alone, as you know, labor kills 
five and twenty men every day! But no one in New York 
thinks of giving up work for that reason! The sea kills 
twenty thousand men every year, but for all that no one thinks 
of giving up all work upon the sea! You have lost friends, 
tunnelmen; I know it! I have lost friends as well as you! 
We are quits! As we are comrades in work, so too we are 
comrades in loss, tunnelmen ! . . .^’ He tried to arouse once 
more the enthusiasm that for six long years had urged his 
armies of workers to an output of work hitherto held to be 
impossible. He said that he was not making the Tunnel 
merely for his own pleasure; that the Tunnel would link 
America and Europe in brotherhood, uniting two worlds, two 
civilizations ; that the Tunnel would give bread to thousands ; 
that the Tunnel was not being made merely to enrich a few 
capitalists, but that it belonged just as much to the people; 
that this had been precisely his object. The Tunnel down 
there belongs to you yourselves, tunnelmen. You yourselves 
have all an interest in the Syndicate ! 

Allan marked how the spark flew over the heads of the 
people. There were outcries, shouting, movements here and 
there. The contact had been effected. . . . 


218 


THE TUNNEL 


‘‘I myself am a working man, tnnnelmen,” trumpeted 
Allan. working man like yourselves. I hate cowards! 
Away with the cowards 1 Only the brave shall remain ! Work 
is not a mere means of eating till one is full! Work is an 
ideal ! Work is the religion of our time ! 

There was shouting. 

So far all had gone well for Allan. But when he called 
upon them to resume work again there was suddenly icy 
silence once more all around him. The terror was coming 
upon them again . . . Allan had lost. 

That evening the leaders of the workers held a meeting 
that lasted till early morning. And in the morning their 
envoys declared that they would not take up the work again. 

The men of the Ocean stations and the European section 
sided with their American comrades. 

That morning Allan dismissed a hundred and eighty thou- 
sand men. Notice was given that they must clear out of 
their living quarters within forty-eight hours. 

The Tunnel was still. Mac City was like a desert. But 
here and there stood parties of militia soldiers, rifle in hand. 


PAET V 


PAET V 


I 

EEVOLT 

The Edison Biograph earned a fortune in these weeks. It 
even showed the catastrophe in the Tunnel, the people fleeing 
for their lives in the galleries. Spectators came in thousands. 

The newspapers, too, reaped a golden harvest, and editors 
were inflated with success. A catastrophe, the Tunnel shafts, 
mass meetings, the strike — ^these were so many bombs flung 
into the midst of the giant army of readers scattered over 
the world athirst for sensations and horrors. 

The Socialist Press of the five continents drew Mac Allan 
as the blood-stained ghost of Time with men’s skuUs in his 
jaw and armor-plated safes in his hands. In the Inter- 
national Press he was daily dragged to pieces. They branded 
the Tunnel Syndicate as the most shameful slavery in the 
world’s history — as the most unheard of tyranny of Capital. 

The workmen who had been dismissed took on a threatening 
aspect. But Allan checkmated them. On the booths, at 
every street corner, on all the cable-posts, a proclamation 
appeared, which ran as follows : Tunnelmen, the Syndicate 

will not be robbed of a single screw without defending itself. 
We hereby declare that in all the Syndicate’s buildings ma- 
chine guns have been placed in readiness. We further declare 
that this is no joke ! ” 

How had this Mac come by the guns? It appeared that 
these weapons had been secretly in position for years — against 
eventualities! Mac was evidently a man to he reckoned 
with! 

Forty-eight hours after the dismissal there was neither 
water nor light in the workmen’s colonies. There was there- 

221 


222 


THE TUNNEL 


fore nothing for it hut to ga if they did not want to come to 
blows with the Syndicate. But the tunnelmen had no in- 
tention of giving in without a row! They wanted to show 
the world that they were there, and before they went they 
intended to let themselves be seen and heard. 

Next day fifty thousand tunnelmen arrived in New York. 
They started in fifty trains, and by twelve o’clock they had 
all arrived in Hoboken; it was like the advance of an army. 
The police had no reason to forbid the masses an entry into 
New York; whoever wished to go there was at liberty to 
do so. But at the various police-stations the telephonic 
apparatus was in constant use with tidings of this army’s 
movements. The Hudson Eiver Tunnel was closed to all 
vehicular traffic for nearly two hours, for the tunnelmen were 
passing through it — a never-ending stream of men — and the 
galleries reverberated with their march and songs. As soon 
as the last one had passed out, the army drew itself up for 
parade, and then wheeled into Christopher Street. At the 
head went a band, making an infernal noise. Then followed 
banners with the word “ Tunnelmen ” embroidered upon them. 
Hard upon them came numbers of other banners belonging 
to the various workmen’s unions, and behind these again, wav- 
ing over their heads, were hundreds of flags of all nationali- 
ties: first the Stars and Stripes, then the Union Jack, then 
the flags of Canada, Mexico, the Argentine, Brazil, Chile, 
Uruguay, Venezuela, Haiti, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, 
Sweden, Norway, Eussia, Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Persia, 
Holland, China, Japan, Australia, New Zealand. Behind this 
gaudy forest trotted hordes of negroes. These men had, for 
the most part, worked themselves up into a passion, and 
rolled their eyes and screamed madly; some fortunately had 
kept their senses, and showed their white teeth while casting 
unmistakable glances at any ladies that let themselves be 
seen. In the midst of them jogged a board with gigantic 
letters Hellmen ! ” In their wake followed a troop bearing 
a gallows. In the noose hung a figure — Allan’s! He was 
recognizable by a flaming red wig on a round head, which had 
been made out of a sack, and by white teeth, outlined in 


EEVOLT 


223 


paint. Shrouded in a mantle cut out of a horse-cloth, similar 
to his well-known striped ulster, the figure bore a striking 
resemblance to Mac. In front of the hanging Allan went a 
huge sign-board, which read: 

Mac Allan, Murderer of Eive Thousand! 

Over the sea of heads, of caps, stiff hats, and headgear of 
every description which raged through Christopher Street and 
Washington Street towards Broadway, hung a row of such 
scarecrows. 

Behind Allan, Lloyd swung on a halter. The head of the 
effigy was painted light brown, the eyes and teeth were tricked 
out in a horrible manner, and the notice which headed this 
corpse ran: 

Lloyd, Thief of Billions — 

Cannibal ! 

Then followed Hobby with a fair wig made of straw, so 
miserably thin that he fluttered in the wind. His poster ran ; 

Hobby I 

He nearly escaped, but we’ve caught him ! 

Then came Woolf. He wore a fez on his head, had puffy 
red lips and big protruding black eyes. Bound his neck 
hung numberless little dolls on threads. 

Woolf with his harem ! 

Jew and champion swindler! 

Then came well-known financiers and the chief engineers of 
the different stations. Amongst these fat Muller of Azora 
received the lion’s share of notice. He was as rotund as a 
balloon — ^his head was represented by an old top hat. 

A fat mouthful for Hell! 

Amongst the moving mass of humanity marched dozens 
nf bands, all playing at once, and filling the narrow cutting 


224 


THE TUNNEL 


of Broadway with a din as of thousands of window-panes 
falling simultaneously on an asphalt paving. The hordes 
of workmen yelled, whistled, laughed, every jaw was tired out 
by the strain of adding to the uproar. Some battalions 
sang the International, others the Marseillaise, others sang 
anything, just letting their voices go. But the accompani- 
ment to the overpowering row was the steady tramp and 
stamp of feet, a sullen accord of boots, which, hour by hour, 
repeated the same word, Tunnel — Tunnel — Tunnel . . 

The Tunnel seemed to have come to New York to speak for 
itself. 

One group in the middle of fhe procession created great 
excitement. In front of it went flags of all nations, and an 
immense board bore the words : 

Mac’s cripples! 

The group consisted of a swarm of men maimed in hand, 
foot or leg ; men with wooden legs, and even some who swayed 
along on crutches, like pendulums. 

The Tunnelmen marched in lines of tens, and the pro- 
cession was nearly five miles long. Its tail just appeared out 
of the Hudson Eiver Tunnel as its head reached Wall Street. 
In perfect order, the army of men turned through Broadway. 
The streets through which it passed, rendered as smooth 
as glass in consequence of the motor traffic, were next day 
pock-marked all over by the hobnailed boots of the pedes- 
trian corps. Traffic was delayed. Endless queues of electric- 
cars, carriages and motors, waited for the end of the proces- 
sion. Every window was packed with curious onlookers. 
Everybody wanted to see the Tunnelmen who, with their 
yellow faces and bent backs, paddled along in their heavy 
footgear. They brought an atmosphere of terror with them 
out of the Tunnel. For they had all been in those gloomy 
galleries where Death, at work, had robbed them of their 
associates. A rattle of chains seemed to arise from the ranks. 

Photographers focused and snap-shotted; moving-picture 


EEYOLT 


ZU 

operators turned their handles. Out of the barbers" shops 
rushed soaped customers, the towel under their chins, out of 
bootmakers", ladies with one shoe in their hand, out of 
clothiers", clients half undressed in the act of trying on. The 
saleswomen, work-room girls and book-keepers, hung, crim- 
son in the face with excitement and craning their necks out 
of curiosity, far over sills of windows twenty stories up. 
They screamed, they waved their handkerchiefs. But the 
volume of sound which arose from the street carried their 
shrill cries upward, and the mass below knew nothing of their 
presence. 

In a modest private car which waited in the midst of the 
surging flood of men, amongst hundreds of other vehicles, sat 
Lloyd and Ethel. Ethel trembled with excitement and curi- 
osity; she kept calling out: ‘^Look at them — just look at 
them — look — ^look ! Look ! "" And she blessed the lucky 
chance which had brought her into the thick of the spectacle. 
‘^Father — here they are, bringing Allan! Don"t you see 
him ? "" 

And Lloyd, who sat cowering well back in the car, peeping 
through a small window, said calmly : Yes, I see, Ethel."" 

As Lloyd was carried past she gave a clear, ringing laugh, 
wild with delight. There you go, father ! "" 

She left her seat at the window and put her arms round 
Lloyd. ‘‘There you are. Don"t you see?"" 

“Yes, I see, Ethel!"" 

Ethel knocked on the window as the “Hellmen"" passed. 
The negroes grinned at her, and pressed the horrible black-red 
palms of their hands against the window panes. But they 
could not stand still, for the men behind were already on their 
heels. 

“Mind you don"t open the window, child!"" said Lloyd 
phlegmatically. 

But as Mac"s cripples passed Ethel raised her eyebrows. 
“ Father,"" she said in a suddenly different tone, “ do you see 
them?"" 

“ I see them, child ! "" 


226 


THE TUNNEL 


The next day Ethel gave ten thousand dollars to be divided 
amongst ‘‘ Mac’s Cripples.” 

Lloyd knew quite well that they were in imminent danger, 
but he did not betray the fact. He was not afraid of being 
done to death; but he knew that as soon as a voice should 
call out, That’s Lloyd’s car ! something would happen. 
Curiosity would make them surround him and their weight 
would crush the vehicle. He would be dragged out, and 
they would both be crushed to death. At best Ethel and 
he would have the pleasure of being carried through New 
York on niggers’ shoulders with the procession — and the idea 
of this he did not relish. He admired Ethel as usual. She 
gave no thought to danger ! In this respect she was like her 
mother. It reminded him of a little scene which had been 
enacted in Australia in the days when she was still a mite. 
A dog sprang at Ethel’s mother. What did the child do? 
She struck the animal with all her baby strength and said 
indignantly, ‘^You go on, you!” And the dog for some 
reason or other drew back. 

Suddenly the motor hummed and the car started. 

Lloyd leant forward and laughed so that his tongue ap- 
peared suddenly between his teeth. He explained to Ethel 
the danger in which they had been for the space of a whole 
hour. 

I am not afraid,” said Ethel, and added smilingly, Why 
should I be afraid of men ? ” 

That’s right, child. A man who fears is but half a man.” 

Ethel was six and twenty, very independent and her father’s 
tyrant, and yet Lloyd still treated her as a child. She let 
him do it, for in the end he always gave in to her. 

When the forest of red flags arrived at the Syndicate build- 
ings, the Tunnelmen found the heavy doors of the structure 
closed, and both the lower stories barricaded with iron shut- 
ters. Not a single face showed itself at one of the four hun- 
dred windows. On the granite steps leading up to the heavy 
oaken doors stood a solitary watchman — a bulky Irishman, 
in a gray linen uniform. His merry blue eyes watched the 
advancing army of workmen as he soothingly and good-na- 


EEYOLT 


227 


turedly raised his hand — a giant’s hand in a white cotton 
glove, looking like a shovelful of snow — repeating to the ac- 
companiment of a gurgling, oily laugh, Keep your shirts 
on, boys ! Keep your shirts on, boys ! ” 

As if by chance, three shining fire-engines (marked home- 
ward bound ”) rattled through Pine Street, and seeing that 
their progress was impeded, shut off steam and waited pa- 
tiently. 

But the truth must out that the genial Irishman with his 
big white gloves and with no weapon — ^not even a baton — 
in his possession, had a whistle in his pocket ! Should he be 
forced to blow that whistle, in the space of one minute these 
three polished, innocent and waiting engines, which swayed 
on their springs out of sheer stifled force, would spurt two 
thousand gallons of water per minute in amongst the crowd ; 
besides this, the five-yard-wide road which lay along the 
window-ledges of the first floor, and which had escaped the 
notice of the crowd, would fall down, and from across it in 
big letters it would send the message fleetly up the street: 
‘‘ Beware ! Two hundred policemen are inside this building, 
so look out ! ” 

A monstrous shrieking towards the four hundred windows 
of the Syndicate’s building arose — a thunderous noise in 
which the mad shindy of the music seemed as nought. 

And presently Mac’s effigy was hanged! To the accom- 
paniment of an ear-piercing din he was dragged up and down 
to the gibbet. The rope gave under the strain, and Mac 
fell with a helpless gesture over the onlookers’ heads. The 
cord was knotted and the execution was repeated amidst 
yells and shrieks. 

Later, standing on two shoulders, a man made a short 
speech. Kot a single word, not even the sound of his voice 
could be gathered in the overwhelming storm of noise. But 
this did not matter, for he spoke with his hungry face, with 
his arms, which he threw into the air, with his hands, whose 
cramped fingers kneaded the words and flung them amongst 
the multitude. He shook, froth on his lips, both fists raised 
against the giant building. And with this his speech was 


228 


THE TUNNEL 


at an end, and all had understood it. A hurricane of screama 
swept along. They took up the cry as far as the Battery. 

Towards the end it might have been necessary to bring the 
firehose into action, for the excitement in front of the build- 
ing became fanatical. But it seemed as if ordained by Provi- 
dence that the demonstration should not reach a point at 
which the rotund Irishman might be flattened out or the three 
shining nozzles brought into play. For whilst two thousand 
demonstrated in front of the building, forty-eight thousand 
pressed behind — with an automatic energy. So it happened 
that each two thousand, which, worked up to a state of fury, 
faced the cavernous building, no sooner reached the point 
of extremest congestion than it was shot out like a bolt from 
a compressed air machine into Wall Street. 

The crowd passed through Pearl Street, up the Bowery to 
Fourth and from there to Fifth Avenue and the vulgar palaces 
of the millionaires. These stood silent — without signs of life. 
In front of Lloyd’s yellow and somewhat weather-stained 
Eenaissance palace, which was separated from the street by a 
strip of garden, the crowd drew up again, for Lloyd was to 
be hanged ” there. His house was as lifeless as the others. 
Only in the corner window of the flrst floor stood a woman 
looking out. It was Ethel. But as none believed that any 
would be courageous enough to let themselves be seen, Ethel 
was taken for one of the maids. The procession hurried past 
Central Park to Columbus Circle, and thence to Madison 
Square. Here the remaining ef&gies were set alight and 
burnt amidst fanatical cries. That was the end of the demon- 
stration. The tunnelmen separated. They lost themselves 
in the saloons along the East Eiver, and in one hour great 
New York had sucked them up. 

The signal had been given to fall in again at ten o’clock 
at the Tunnel Station of Hoboken. But here the tunnelmen 
were met by a surprise. The station was entrenched behind 
policemen’s broad chests and as the men only arrived piece- 
meal, their spirit of adventure had evaporated. Notices an- 


KEVOLT 


229 


nounced that unmarried workmen need no longer seek work 
in Mac City. Only the married men would be sent back. A 
herd of agents took control, and at intervals of half an hour 
trains were rolling back to Mac City. At about six o’clock the 
last one was steaming out of the station. 


II 


BACK BIEB 

Whilst the noise roared round the Syndicate buildings, Allan 
held a conference with Woolf and the second financial director 
of the Syndicate, Easmussen. The financial position of the 
Syndicate was in no wise alarming, but it was also not satis- 
factory. For the following January, the second loan of a 
thousand million had been prepared, but under the present 
circumstances it was out of the question. Nobody would 
provide a cent. 

The menace of explosion in the American south galleries, 
the news of the strike, both were repeated on every Exchange 
in the world. The shares fell twenty-five per cent, in a few 
days, for everybody wanted to be rid of them as soon as possi- 
ble and no one was anxious to back a losing game. A week 
after the catastrophe a panic seemed imminent. But Woolf 
stepped, with the courage of despair, into the breach — and 
the panic was averted! He improvised a seductive balance 
sheet for the public, bribed a host of financial experts ’’ 
and swamped the press of the Old and the New Worlds with 
reassuring announcements. 

The exchange improved, then remained stationary. Woolf 
began the murderous battle of letting the Exchange fall no 
lower and trying to screw it upwards. In his office in the 
tenth story of the building, he worked with dogged energy 
at his plans of campaign. Whilst the hordes howled below, 
he put his propositions quietly before Allan. The mineral 
by-products of the Tunnel were to be made the most of. 
Woolf had offered a contract to the Pittsburg Smelting and 
Eefining Company. The Company was to collect the ore, 
and the Syndicate would take over the production the same 
day. Eor this he demanded sixty per cent, of the net profits. 

230 


BACK FIEE 


231 


The Company knew full well that the Syndicate was hard up 
and offered thirty per cent. Woolf swore that he would rather 
be buried alive than accept the scandalous offer. He imme- 
diately turned to the ‘^American Smelters,” whereupon the 
Pittsburg Company returned with an offer of forty per cent. 
Woolf came down to fifty per cent, and threatened that, in 
the future, the Syndicate should not draw up another handful 
of ore ; the galleries would simply be carried under or over the 
reef. Finally, they agreed on forty-six and a third per cent. 
Over that last third Woolf fought like a Turk and the 
Pittsburg people remarked that they would rather have deal- 
ings with the devil than with that shark.” 

Woolf had changed greatly within the last two years. He 
had grown stouter and more asthmatic. His dark eyes still 
had that slightly sad, oriental light and his long black lashes 
were so thick that they seemed artificial. But the fire in his 
eyes was dulled and he was turning quickly gray. He no 
longer wore his beard cut short, but in thick gray tufts on his 
chin and on both cheeks. With his powerful forehead, his 
wide protruding eyes and his broad curved nose, he was not 
unlike a buffalo. This impression was strengthened by the 
bloodshot eye. During the last years, he had a hard battle 
with a perpetual congestion in the head. As each volley 
of cries reached him from below, he drew himself together 
and his eyes showed a flickering light. He was not more 
cowardly than other men, but the breathless speed of the 
last years had affected his nerves. 

And besides this, Woolf had other cares, which he wisely 
kept from the world . . . 

After the conference, Allan remained alone once more. 
He walked up and down his oflSce. His face was thin, his 
eyes dull and miserable. And no sooner was he left to him- 
self than disquieting thoughts came over him and he felt that 
he must move about. A thousand times did he walk up and 
down dragging his grief with him from one end of the room 
to the other. Sometimes he stood still and considered. 

Then he telephoned to Mac City and asked after Hobby, 
who had fever and could be seen by nobody. So he pulled 


232 


THE TUNNEL 


himself together and went ont and returned in the evening 
somewhat refreshed — ready for the fray again. He worked 
at various projects for the improvement of the submarine 
shaft. The unlucky shaft, in which death had for millions 
of years glowered at the tunnelmen, was to prove a mine of 
incalculable worth. 

The projects interested him and forced gloomy visions 
aside. Not for a second did he dare think of the things that 
lay behind him . . . 

It was late when he turned in, and he considered himself 
fortunate when he slept for two hours at a stretch without 
being the prey of terrifying dreams. Once only, he dined at 
Lloyd’s. Ethel Lloyd chatted with him before dinner. She 
showed such feeling over the death of Maud and Edith that 
Allan began to see her in a new light. Suddenly she seemed 
to have grown older and to have matured. 

Afterwards, Allan spent some uninterrupted weeks in the 
Tunnel. 

A break of over a month, which under ordinary conditions 
of traffic could only have been rendered possible through 
prodigious financial sacrifice, was very welcome to him. From 
the continuous working at high pressure, all the engineers 
were exhausted and needed rest. Allan did not attach any 
importance to the workmen’s strike. Nor did he show any 
signs of anxiety when the Union, the electricians, the iron 
and cement workers, the masons, the carpenters, decreed the 
closing of the Tunnel. 

For the moment, what was necessary was to cope with the 
galleries, if they were not to fall into a state of neglect. For 
this work, an army of eight thousand engineers and volunteers 
were at his disposal and these he divided over the different 
stretches. Under tremendous physical strain, these eight 
thousand defended the undertaking. The bells of the solitary 
trains passing through the empty Tunnel clanged monoto- 
nously. The Tunnel was silent, and each and all needed time 
to accustom themselves to the deathlike stillness reigning 
in the galleries which but recently had hummed with life. 

In the shaft on which so much depended, there were, day 


BACK FIRE 


233 


and night, a thousand half-naked, perspiring workmen of the 
Cleveland Mining Company busy with the boring machines, 
with blastings and engine shafts. The overheated shaft 
bnzzed and rang with work, just as if nothing had happened. 
The daily output was of colossal value. 

But, for the rest, it was all dead. The Tunnel town was 
extinct. Wanamaker had shut his store, the Tunnel Hotel 
had put up its shutters. In the workmen’s colony women and 
children huddled — they were the widows and orphans of the 
dead men. 


Ill 


AT THE WHEEL AGAIN 

The proceedings which had been instituted aginst the Syn- 
dicate fell through, by reason of the bringing forward of a 
plea of force majeure. 

As long as the case remained undecided Allan was forced 
to stay in New York. But now he was free, and he left the 
country immediately. He spent the winter in the Azores and 
Bermuda and remained a few weeks in Biscaya. Once he 
turned up at the power station on the He de Quessant — then 
all trace of him was lost. 

Spring found him in Paris, where, in an old hotel in the 
Eue Eichelieu, he put up under the name of C. Connor, 
merchant from Denver. No one recognized him, though 
everybody must have seen his portrait hundreds of times. 
He had purposely chosen this hotel to avoid the class of men 
he most hated — ^the idle rich, and the gossips who go from 
hotel to hotel and treat their meals as religious functions. 

Allan lived alone. Each afternoon found him seated at the 
same little marble table on the Boulevard, drinking his coffee 
and gazing silently and nonchalantly at the passers-by. From 
time to time his glance turned to a balcony on the second 
floor of the hotel opposite; years ago he had stayed there 
with Maud. Sometimes a woman in a light frock appeared 
on the balcony; a spell seemed to come over him then. He 
went daily to the children’s corner in the Luxembourg Gardens, 
and watched the mites playing. There was a bench there 
on which Maud and Edith had once sat, and to this same 
bench Allan went regularly and watched the children as they 
scrambled round. 

During the course of the spring and summer he took the 
234 


AT THE WHEEL AGAIN 


235 


same journey which, years before, he had undertaken with 
Maud and Edith. He went to London, Liverpool, Berlin, 
Vienna, Frankfort, accompanied only by dreary, bitter-sweet 
remembrances. He stayed in the same hotels, and often even 
in the same rooms. His nights he passed sleeplessly on a 
sofa in a darkened room. There he sat with wide open 
dry eyes, motionless. Sometimes he murmured remarks 
to Maud, as he would have done had she been alive : Go 

to sleep, Maud.” Don’t spoil your eyes ! ” He reproached 
himself for having acted as a task-master to her while he had 
been in the throes of preparing his great undertaking. It 
seemed to him that he had never made her understand the 
full extent of his love, that he had never even loved her 
enough — ^not as he loved her now. Full of pain and remorse, 
he remembered that he had often neglected Maud’s re- 
proaches. Alas ! He had not really understood how to make 
his darling happy. With burning eyes, overpowered by 
misery, he would huddle in the silent rooms till daybreak. 

It is daylight, the birds are singing, do you hear ? ” he 
heard Maud say. And Allan answered in a whisper, ‘^Yes, 
I hear them, dear heart.” Then he would throw himself on 
the bed. 

One day he came to the conclusion he would like to possess 
objects that had stood in the rooms so sacred to him — a 
chandelier, a clock, an inkstand. The proprietors, who took 
Mr. Connor for a fanciful rich American, demanded unheard 
of prices, and Allan paid them without turning a hair. 

In August he returned to Paris and settled down once more 
in the old quarters in the Kue Eichelieu, the light in his eyes 
gloomier than before. He gave the impression of a man 
suffering from melancholia who passes through life blindly, 
buried in his own thoughts. For weeks he would not utter 
a word. 

One evening he was walking through the Latin Quarter, 
in a busy and sinuous street, when suddenly he heard his 
name. He stood still and looked round. Nobody seemed to 
recognize him — ^he saw no face he knew. And then he saw 
his name, in gigantic letters facing him. 


236 


THE TUNNEL 


It was a gaudy notice of the Edison Bio: ^^Mac Allan, 
constructeur du ‘ Tunnel ’ et Mr. Hobby, ingenieur en chef, 
conversant avec leurs collaborateurs a Mac City.^^ 

Allan went hesitatingly into the darkened hall. A senti- 
mental film was in progress — this bored him. But a little 
child, who reminded him distantly of Edith, appeared on 
the screen, and the power of resemblance held him in the 
overcrowded room. This little Yvonne had the same charm 
of manner, the same serious way of chatting with her 
elders . . . 

Suddenly he heard his name fall from the lecturer’s lips, 
and at the same instant, his town ” lay before him, shimmer- 
ing through the dust and smoke. A group of engineers stood 
at the station — every face was familiar to him. At a signal 
they all turned round awaiting a motor, which drew up slowly. 
In the motor he saw himself, and at his side. Hobby. Hobby 
got up, called something out to the engineers, and they all 
broke into a laugh. A dull pain came over Allan when he 
saw Hobby : impudent, exuberant Hobby ! The Tunnel 
had done for him as it had done for so many others. 

The motor passed on slowly, and he saw himself stand 
up and lean back over the car. An engineer touched 
his hat and made a sign of assent. The lecturer commented : 
“ The genial constructor gives orders to his colleagues ! ” 

The man who had touched his hat seemed to look inquiringly 
towards the audience, and his glance rested on Allan, as if he 
had discovered him. Then Allan recognized the features! 
they were Barmann’s — those of the man who had been shot 
on the 10th of October. 

Suddenly the Tunnel trains began running ; they flew down 
the steep inclines, one after another, throwing a cloud of dust 
into the air behind them. 

Allan’s heart beat. He sat as if possessed, restless, his 
head burning, his breath coming so spasmodically that people 
at his side laughed. 

But the trains disappeared. . . . Allan rose. He left at 
once. He stepped into a car and drove to his hotel. Here 
he inquired of the manager when the next American liner 


AT THE WHEEL AGAIN 


237 


was due to sail. The manager mentioned a Cunarder which 
was sailing from Liverpool next morning. The night express 
had already started. “ Order a special at once,” said Allan. 
The manager gazed at Allan, surprised at his voice and tone. 
What extraordinary change had come over the man since 
midday? He seemed another being. 

Certainly,” he replied, but I must have certain guar- 
antees from you, Mr. Connor.” 

Allan stepped towards the lift. ‘‘Why? Say Mac Allan 
from New York orders the train ! ” 

Then the manager recognized him and drew back dumb- 
founded — ^he buried his surprise in a deep bow. 

A transformation had, indeed, come over Allan. He slept 
soundly that night — the first night for a long, long time. 
Just once did he awaken — as the train thundered through a 
tunnel. “ They have built the galleries too small,” he mut- 
tered and then slept on. 

At daybreak he felt refreshed and healthier — full of deter- 
mination. At ten o^clock he reached the vessel, which in a 
fever of impatience at the delay, was blowing clouds of steam 
out of its funnel. His foot was scarcely on the ship^s gangway 
when the screws began to revolve. 

Half an hour later, the whole ship knew that the late comer 
was none other than Mac Allan. 

Once on the high seas, Allan began sending off wireless 
messages. 

On Biscaya, the Azores, Bermuda, New York, Mac City, 
messages fell like rain. In the dark galleries under the sea, 
a life-giving stream was fiowing. Allan was once more at 
the wheel. 


IV 


CLOUDS OU THE HOEIZOU 

The first person whom Allan visited was Hobby, whose 
country-house was a little way outside Mac City. 

Mac rang, no one answered. The bell was out of order. 
The house looked as if it had been forsaken for a long time, 
and yet all the windows were wide open and the garden door 
was locked. Allan decided to climb over the fence. The 
garden was full of dead oak leaves and as forsaken as the 
house. Hobby seemed to have disappeared. 

Allan’s surprise and pleasure were therefore all the greater 
when he suddenly saw Hobby before him. He was sitting on 
the steps that led into the garden, his chin in his right hand, 
deep in thought. 

Hobby was as usual elegantly dressed, but the clothes 
were those of a young man and the wearer seemed aged and 
shrunken. 

He sat in the attitude of a healthy, intelligent man and 
Allan already felt happier. But as he raised his eyes and 
Allan saw his sad, wandering expression, his wrinkled, drab 
and aged face, he knew that Hobby’s health had failed. 

So there you are again, Mac,” said Hobby, without 
attempting to shake hands or move. Where have you 
been?” And round his eyes and mouth the wrinkled skin 
formed into tiny angles. He smiled. His voice soundedi 
strange and gasping, though at the back of it the old ring was 
there. 

^^I’ve been in Europe, Hobby. How are you, old man?” 

Hobby again looked straight in front of him. I’m better, 
Mac. My damned head is at work again, too.” 

Do you live quite alone. Hobby ? ” 

^^Yes, I threw the servants out, they worried me.” 

238 


CLOUDS ON THE HOEIZON 


239 


What does the doctor say ? ” 

He seems pleased. Patience, is what he keeps on saying 
' — patience.” 

^‘Why are all the windows open? It looks so desolate.” 

‘‘ I like draughts,” answered Hobby with a strange laugh. 

A shiver passed over his whole body and he tossed his white 
hair as they climbed up to his study. 

‘^I’m at work again, Mac. You’ll see. It’s something 
quite new.” And he winked his right eye, just as the old 
Hobby used to do. 

He showed Mac some sheets scrawled all over with wild 
lines and signs. The drawings were supposed to be of his 
nine dogs. But they might have been the work of a child, 
while all round the walls hung Hobby’s ambitious designs 
for railway stations and warehouses, all showing the genius of 
the master-hand. 

Allan had the good sense to praise the sketches. 

Yes, they really are fine,” said Hobby proudly and while 
he was speaking, he poured out two glasses of whisky. It’s 
gradually coming back to me, Mac. Only I get tired so easily. 
You’ll be seeing birds soon. Birds. When I sit here just 
like this, I often see strange birds in my mind — ^millions 
of ’em, and they’re all moving. Drink, old man, drink, 
drink.” 

Hobby dropped into a shabby leather armchair and yawned. 

^‘Was Maud with you in Europe?” he asked suddenly. 

Allan twitched and turned pale. A sensation of dizziness 
overcame him. 

‘‘Maud?” he murmured, and as he said it the mere fact 
of pronouncing her name made him cringe. 

Hobby blinked and struggled with some idea. Then he got 
up and said : “ Have some more whisky ? ” 

Allan shook his head. “ Thanks — I don’t take much 
during the day.” And with a sad expression on his face, he 
gazed through the withering trees far out to sea. A small 
black steamship was making its way slowly towards the south. 
He watched it mechanically and, as he watched, it suddenly 
remained motionless between two boughs. 


240 


THE TUNNEL 


Hobby sat down again and a long silence followed. The 
wind blew right through the room and shook the last leaves 
from the trees. Over the sandhills and the sea heavy 
clouds passed rapidly and awoke in his mind an eerie feeling 
of hopelessness and gloomy forebodings. 

Then Hobby spoke again. 

‘^That’s the way with my head sometimes/’ he said, 
know quite well what has happened. But I get muddled. 
Maud — ^poor Maud! Have you heard, too, that Herz has 
blown himself up with his whole laboratory? The explo- 
sion tore up a big part of the street and killed thirteen other 
people.” 

Doctor Herz was a chemist who worked at explosives for 
the Tunnel. Allan had already had this news on board. 

‘‘It is a pity,” added Hobby, “for that new discovery of 
his must have been first rate.” And he smiled greedily. 
“ Such a pity I ” 

Allan turned the conversation on to the sheepdog, and for 
a time Hobby seemed to follow him. Then he went off 
again at a tangent. 

“ What a dear Maud was 1 ” he said, apropos of nothing. 
“An absolute child! And yet she always pretended to be 
cleverer than any one else. Sometimes she grumbled that you 
left her alone so often. And I used to say to her, ‘Never 
mind, Maud, you know it can’t be otherwise.’ Once we 
kissed each other. I remember it as if it were to-day. 
Heavens ! How distinctly I seem to hear her voice — she used 
to call me Frank ” 

Allan stared at Hobby. But he asked no questions. And 
Hobby stared into space with a frightened, sightless look in 
his eyes. 

After a while Allan got up to go. Hobby went with him as 
far as the garden gate. 

“ Now, Hobby,” said Allan, “ won’t you come with me ? ” 

“Where to?” 

“To the Tunnel.” Hobby turned pale and trembled like 
an aspen leaf. 

“ No — ^no,” he kept repeating, with a furtive, uncertain look. 


CLOUDS ON THE HORIZON 241 

And Allan regretted his invitation, for Hobby was feeling it 
keenly. 

“ Good-by, Hobby, I’ll come back to-morrow.” 

Hobby stood at the gate, his head slightly bent, a color- 
less figure with the wind playing through his white hair. 

As the dog barked angrily at the retreating figure. Hobby 
laughed — a sickly, childish laugh, which rang in Allan’s ears 
far into the night. 

Within the next few days Allan came to terms with the 
Workmen’s Union. They were easier to deal with now. 
As a matter of fact the Union could no longer keep up the 
boycott of the Tunnel. With the beginning of winter, 
thousands of farm hands were drifting from the West in 
search of work. Last winter, the Union had had to pay out 
immense sums to the unemployed, and this winter the distri- 
bution would be greater than ever. 

Since the work on the Tunnel had ceased, business in the 
quarries, in the iron foundries, and in the machine factories 
had dwindled incredibly, and an army of men was thrown 
on to the streets. Wages fell, for there was such a glut of 
labor that even the earners received but scant remuneration. 

The Union held meetings, and Allan addressed them in New 
York, Cincinnati, Chicago, Pittsburg, and Buffalo. He was 
tough and tireless. His voice rang clear and his fist struck 
powerfully through the air as he spoke. As his buoyant 
nature showed itself again, his old power over an audience 
seemed to return. The newspapers echoed with his name. 

Everything seemed in his favor, and Allan hoped to set 
the work going in November — December at latest. 

Then, quite unexpectedly as far as Allan was concerned, 
a second storm swept over the Syndicate — a storm of further 
reaching results than the October catastrophe. 

Through the giant edifice of the Tunnel Syndicate an 
ominous rumble was heard . . . 


V 


THE GENTLE AKT OF HIGH FINANCE 

With his accustomed dignity, Woolf drove in his fifty horse- 
power car along Broadway. On the stroke of eleven he ap- 
peared at the club, drank his coffee and played his game of 
poker. He understood that nothing makes the world more 
suspicious than a change in a man’s mode of living, so he spent 
his time in every particular as in the old days. 

But he himself was changed. For Woolf had his cares, 
which he had to bear alone. That was not easy. 

It was no longer a change for him to sup with one of his 
‘^nieces,” or ‘^flames.” His excited nerves needed orgies, 
excesses, gipsy choruses and dances to quiet them. In the 
evening, enervated by fatigue, his forehead burnt like a 
furnace. Night after night, it ended in his seeking oblivion 
in drink. 

He was a careful spendthrift. His enormous income more 
than sufficed to cover his extravagances. This was not the 
key to his anxieties. Two years ago he had been caught in a 
whirlpool of quite another kind, and, in spite of his mighty 
efforts to reach the calm water, month by month he was drawn 
nearer to the heart of the maelstrom. 

And now his bushy buffalo head had laid a plan of campaign 
worthy of a Napoleon. He had toyed with an idea, he had 
almost caressed it. He had cared for it and nourished it. 
The thought — elusive as smoke — gradually materialized. 
And one day it stood before him as mighty as a mountain 
and it overpowered him. 

Woolf had to come to a decision! 

He could snap his fingers at mere money. Those days were 
long over in which money for money’s sake meant anything 
to him. He could make it out of the dirt in the street, out 

242 


THE GENTLE AET OF HIGH FINANCE 243 


of the air, for there it lay in millions in his brain, and he had 
only to coin it. Without a name, without a penny in his 
pocket, he would wager to pile up a fortune in the inside 
of a year. The money was nothing — only a means to an end. 
Woolf was now only a satellite circling round Allan. He 
wanted to be an orb round which other revolved ! 

Why shouldn’t he do what all the others had done — ^the 
Lloyds and other industrial magnates? It was just what 
young Wolff sohn had done twenty years before when he 
had staked his all on one stroke, rigged himself out so well, 
put thirty shillings into his pocket, and set out for England. 
It was his fate, more powerful than himself, that forced him 
into it, and even appointed the time. 

From this moment Woolf was an altered being. His plan 
was ready, engraved in his brain, minutely detailed, invisible 
to the world. In ten years’ time Woolf would be the new 
great power. In ten years that new great power would an- 
nex the Tunnel. 

He did what thousands have done before him, but what 
none ever did on so massive a scale. It was no ordinary 
fortune he wanted. He had reckoned that for his plan fifty 
millions were necessary. So he set out to get fifty millions. 
He played his cards coolly, carefully, untroubled by pricks 
of conscience. 

He speculated on his own account, although his contract 
specially forbade it. But his contract was merely a piece of 
paper, dead and worthless, and this clause had been added to 
it to tie his hands. He no longer cared. He bought up the 
whole of the Georgia cotton crop, sold it again the next 
week, and made two million dollars. With the Syndicate 
to back him, he did his business without touching one dol- 
lar of their money. In a year he had his five million dollars. 
With these he made a dead set for the Cuban tobacco crop. 
But a cyclone destroyed the plantations, and the five mil- 
lions dwindled away. Woolf did not lose heart. He tried 
again with cotton, and this was true to him. He won. He 
seemed to hold a series of winning cards in his hand, for his 
luck pursued him, and each time he put up a big fight. Then 


244 


THE TUNNEL 


followed disaster. Copper, in which he had made a corner, 
played him false. There were large stores of it of which he 
knew nothing; they were thrown on the market, and almost 
ruined him. He lost, and, at last, had to draw on the Syn- 
dicate’s reserves. 

He was caught in the whirlpool. He puffed out his chest, 
drew a long breath and struck out . . . but the current 
was treacherous. Woolf was a magnificent swimmer, but 
he made no headway. In fact, glancing backward, he had 
to acknowledge that he was losing ground. He swam madly, 
and swore that when once he reached smooth water nothing 
would ever make him tempt providence again. 

These were the man’s cares, of which no one could relieve 
him. 

Last year he had been able to show a handsome balance in 
hand. He still enjoyed the Syndicate’s fullest confidence. 

Times were had; the October catastrophe had devastated 
the market, and he turned pale when he thought of the fol- 
lowing January. 

It was now a matter of life and death. 

Money ! Money ! Money ! 

He was short of three or four million dollars — a mere noth- 
ing — ^two or three strokes of good fortune, and he would have 
the ground under his feet once again. 

He fought for his luck heroically. 

At first, he only undertook small risks, but, as summer 
approached and he felt himself gaining ground, slowly he 
made up his mind for a splash. He was not afraid of playing 
with fire. He tried cotton, and laid his hand on copper. 
If only these giant speculations succeeded he was saved. 

He traveled all over Europe and Kussia, nosing out spots 
which were worth storming. He cut down his own expenses 
to the lowest figure. No more specials, no more extra coaches ; 
he contented himself with an ordinary first-class compartment. 
He cut down expenses also in the matter of philandering — 
in the old days a big item. 

He rushed across Europe like a fury, and left behind him 
everywhere agents and representatives. He sold timber in 


THE GENTLE ART OF HIGH FINANCE 245 


Westphalia and iron structures in Belgium, he changed his 
holdings of stocks every day. With a brutal lack of con- 
sideration he threatened the speculators in real estate in. 
London, Paris and Berlin who possessed land values in Biscay 
and the Azores, and were backward in their payments through 
the crisis. They had to climb down. Numerous small banks 
broke. Woolf knew no mercy, he was fighting for his life. 

In Petrograd, for the small consideration of three million 
roubles, he had received wood concessions in the North of 
Siberia to the value of one hundred million, on which he 
made twenty per cent. He turned the undertaking into a 
joint stock company, and drew out half the Syndicate’s 
capital. But he did this in such fashion that the Syndicate 
had almost the same income as before. These proceedings 
were not regular, but, in case of anything happening, he had 
his own spare cash ready. He made money anywhere and 
anyway he could. 

This mad chase round Europe left him no time for any- 
thing else. But he could not find it in his heart to return 
to America without seeing his father. He arranged a three 
days’ festivity, in which the whole village of Szentes took part. 
Here in his birthplace, in the very corner of Hungary where 
as a poor man’s child he saw the light, the first disquieting 
message reached him. 

A few of his small speculations had gone wrong — ^the out- 
posts of his army were defeated. The first cable he thrust 
carelessly into his deep American pocket. But with the 
receipt of the second, he became oblivious to his surroundings ; 
he heard the singers no longer — ^he seemed to have lost one of 
his senses — and as the third one was handed to him, he ordered 
the horses to be harnessed and drove to the station. 

He had no eyes for the well-known landscape glowing in 
ardent sunlight — ^his gaze looked far away into the distance 
— into New York, into Mac Allan’s face! 

In Buda-Pest more Job’s comfort awaited him ; the corner 
in cotton could no longer be kept up without gigantic losses, 
and his agent was awaiting the word to sell. Woolf wavered. 
Three days before he would have made millions out of cotton. 


246 


THE TUNNEL 


Why had he not sold? Why? He knew cotton — had he 
not worked in it for three solid years ? He knew the market 
— Liverpool, Chicago, New York, Eotterdam, New Orleans — 
every single broker; he dived daily into the maze of figures, 
he listened with his keen ear all over the world. He was a 
living seismograph, which marked the most delicate shocks 
and tremblings and registered every deviation in the markets. 

Erom Buda-Pest he traveled to Paris, and only when 
passing through Vienna did he give his Liverpool agent orders 
to sell. It was to him physical pain — ^but he suddenly lost 
courage to risk all. 

An hour later he regretted this order, and yet he could not 
decide to recall it. Por the first time since he had known his 
own strength did he mistrust his instinct. 

He felt languid, as after an orgy; he could come to no 
decision and waited for something, he knew not what. It 
seemed to him that a weakening poison had entered his 
system. Evil forebodings arose in his mind, sometimes fever 
gripped him. He would feel drowsy and wake up suddenly. 
He would dream that he was ^phoning to his representatives 
in the big cities, and all, one ifter the other, answered that 
everything was lost. He awoke again as the voices united in 
a lamentable chorus of misery. And yet all he had heard 
was a jolt of the train at a curve. He sat up and stared into 
the lamp in the roof of the compartment. Then he took out 
his notebook and began to add up. And while he counted, 
a paralysis overpowered his feet and arms, and crept to- 
wards his heart. He dared not put his Liverpool losses on 
paper. ‘‘1 dare not sell!^^ he muttered to himself. ^^ITl 
wire as soon as the train stops. Why is there no telephone on 
these antediluvian trains? If I sell now I am a dead man, 
unless copper brings in forty per cent., and that’s unlikely. 
I must risk all — ^it’s my last chance ! ” 

He was speaking Hungarian! That, too, was surprising, 
for he generally did all his business in English, the only 
language in which money transaction could properly be made. 

When the train came finally to a standstill, a curious weak- 
ness held him back on the* cushions. He felt like a general 


THE GENTLE AET OF HIGH FINANCE 247 


whose whole army is imder fire. And he had no faith in the 
outcome of the battle. His head was full of figures. Wher- 
ever he looked he saw them, seven or eight in a row, column 
after column, enormous sums of enormous length. The 
figures were all accurately printed, and as if cut on copper 
plate. They appeared of their own accord, changed for no 
reason, crossed from the debit to the credit column, or again 
disappeared in a flash. 

They made him break into a cold perspiration — he felt he 
was going off his head. So great, so ghastly was his rage 
that in his helplessness he cried. 

Pursued by demoniacal figures, he arrived in Paris. It 
took him a few days to pull himself together. He was like a 
man who, without any warning of sickness, falls down in the 
street, and, when convalescent, lives in perpetual fear of an- 
other attack. 

A week later he learnt that his instinct had not misled 
him. 

The corner in cotton had gone over into other hands as 
soon as he had sold. A ring had got it into their power, 
had held it for a week, and sold out again one million to the 
good ! 

Woolf foamed with anger! If only he had followed the 
dictate of his instinct, he would have been on solid ground! 

That was his first great mistake. Within the next few 
days he made a second. He held on to copper too long; 
only three days too long — and then he sold. He made on it, 
but three days earlier he would have scored double. He 
made twelve per cent.; three days sooner it would have been 
twenty-five per cent. Twenty-five! And he would have 
been in sight of land ! He turned purple in the face. 

How was it that he continued making mistake after mis- 
take ? Cotton he sold a week too soon, copper three days too 
late ! He had grown uncertain. His hands were always damp 
with perspiration, and he shivered. He sometimes stumbled 
in the road, a sudden dizziness overcoming him ; he even lacked 
courage at times to cross a street. 

It was October. To be exact, the tenth of October — the 


248 


THE TUNNEL 


anniversary of the catastrophe. He still had three months 
before him, and there was just a faint possibility that he might 
save himself. But he must rest for a few days and get up his 
strength. 

He set out for San Sebastian. 

He had been there three days, and had improved so greatly 
that he was feeling in the mood for philandering again, when 
a message came to him from Allan to the effect that his pres- 
ence was required immediately in New York, and that he 
would be expected by the next steamer. 

He started next day. 


VI 


LLOYD’S WAENING 

One day in October Ethel Lloyd sent in her name to Allan, 
to his great astonishment. 

She entered his room, and glanced round quickly. 

Are you alone ? ” she asked, smiling. 

Yes, quite alone. Miss Lloyd.” 

‘‘That’s all right,” Ethel laughed softly. “But don’t be 
alarmed. I am only an express messenger. Papa has sent 
me to you with a letter, but I was to give it to you only if you 
were by yourself.” 

She drew a letter out of a pocket in her cloak. 

“Thanks,” said Allan, as he took it from her. 

“ It must be something rather special, but you know how 
strange he is in many ways.” She went on chattering volubly, 
Allan occasionally putting in a word. “You have been in 
Europe, haven’t you?” she asked. “We had a wonderful 
experience this summer — ^we went all the way to Canada in a 
caravan. There were five of us, two men and three women. 
We were in the open air all the time. We slept out in the 
open, and did our own cooking. We took a tent with us, and 
a little rowing-boat, which we had stowed away up on the roof 
of the caravan. Those are plans, aren’t they ? ” 

Ethel had been allowing her gaze to stray unceremoniously 
all round the room, a thoughtful smile on her beautifully- 
shaped lips. 

Allan’s room looked dreadfully prosaic. A well-worn 
carpet, a couple of the leather arm-chairs inevitable in such 
an office, and a safe. Half a dozen desks and tables strewn 
with documents. Stands covered with maps and plans. A 
wilderness of papers lying about the fioor. The walls covered 
with immense plans of sections of the Tunnel or of the 

249 


250 


THE TUNNEL 


building grounds, together with charts of the ocean, and 
diagrams representing the curves of the Tunnel, which looked 
like architectural designs for suspension bridges. 

Ethel laughed. ‘‘How beautifully neat you keep your 
room ! she said. 

The plainness of it had not surprised her. She thought 
of her father’s ofidce, the only furniture of which consisted 
of a writing-table, a chair, a cuspidor, and a telephone. 

She looked Allan in the eyes. “I believe your work is 
the most interesting any human being ever carried through,” 
she said, with a look of genuine enthusiasm in her face. 
Suddenly she jumped up and clapped her hands delight- 
edly. 

“ Heavens, what a view ! ” she cried. She had glanced 
out of the window, and caught sight of the panorama of New 
York. 

Thin columns of white smoke were rising in the sunlight 
from thousands of flat roofs. New York was at work like 
some monstrous steam-engine with a myriad of valves. The 
windows of the immense tower-houses glittered. Down below 
tiny ant-lil^e creatures and little specks of cars moved about 
on Broadway. Between two groups of sky-scrapers there 
was a vista of the Hudson, with a tiny steamer on it — a mere 
toy it looked, with its four funnels: an ocean liner of fifty 
thousand tons. 

“ Isn’t it magnificent ? ” cried Ethel. 

“Have you never seen New York before from such a 
height ? ” asked Allan. 

Ethel nodded. “I have flown over it with Vanderstyfft 
several times,” she said. “But you have to keep your veil 
tightly pressed to your face, and you see nothing.” 

Ethel spoke quite naturally and simply, and seemed the 
incarnation of frankness and cordiality. Allan asked himself 
how it was that he never felt quite at his ease with her. He 
could not manage to talk unreservedly with her. Perhaps it 
was only her voice that irritated him. There are only two 
kinds of women’s voices in America — a deep, soft voice which 
seems to come from low down in the larynx (Maud’s had been 


LLOYD’S WAKNIN-Q 


251 


like that), and a sharp, nasal voice, with a sharp, resonant 
sound. Such was Ethel’s. 

Ethel made ready to go. At the door she asked Allan 
whether he would not come for a trip some day on her 
yacht. 

At present every moment of my time is taken up with 
important business, I’m afraid/’ he replied, opening Lloyd’s 
letter. 

‘^Well, some other time. Good-by!” and Ethel went o£E 
gayly. 

Lloyd’s letter was brief and bore no signature. It ran: 

Keep an eye on S. W.” 

S. W. was S. Woolf. Allan felt the blood coursing to his 
head. 

Lloyd would not send him such a warning without good rea- 
sons for it. Was it his instinct that had prompted it? 
Or had he spies at work ? Allan became a prey to gloomy fore- 
bodings. Financial matters were outside his province, and 
he had never troubled his head about Woolf. That was 
for the General Administration to look after, and apparently 
all had gone well all these years. 

He sent at once for Rasmussen, Woolf’s deputy. In quite 
an ordinary tone of voice he asked him to get together a com- 
mittee for the purpose of making out a complete statement 
of the financial position of the Syndicate. He was anxious 
to resume work soon, and wanted to know what amount of 
money would be immediately available for the purpose. 

Rasmussen was a Swede of distinction, who had preserved 
his European courtesy of manner throughout a twenty years’ 
residence in America. 

He bowed and inquired, ^‘Do you wish the committee to 
begin work to-day, Mr. Allan ? ” 

Allan shook his head. There’s no such hurry as all that, 
Rasmussen,” he replied. ‘^But to-morrow morning. Can 
you choose its members by then ? ” 

Rasmussen smiled. ‘^Certainly.” 

That evening Allan spoke with admirable effect to the 
council of delegates of the mining companies. 


252 


THE TUNNEL 


On that same evening Easmussen shot himself. 

Allan’s face went white when he heard the news. He at 
once recalled Woolf and instituted a secret inquiry. A condi- 
tion of chaos was discovered. It became apparent that em- 
bezzlement on an enormous scale that could not yet be gauged 
had been going on by means of fraudulent entries and all 
kinds of subtle manipulations. Whether Easmussen or Woolf 
were responsible was not yet ascertainable. But it was found 
that Woolf’s balance for the previous year had been cooked,” 
and that the Eeserve Fund betrayed a deficit amounting to 
from six to seven million dollars. 


VII 


CALLED TO ACCOUNT 

Woolf crossed the Atlantic in blissful ignorance of the fact 
that two detectives accompanied him. 

He had come to the conclusion that it was best to let Allan 
know of the losses. But he had continued to make these latter 
appear a mere bagatelle by the side of other transactions 
which promised enormous gains. This made him feel more at 
his ease. When the news of Easmussen’s suicide reached 
him by wireless, he became seriously alarmed. He tele- 
graphed back message after message. He declared he would 
answer for Easmussen’s honesty, and would at once set an 
inquiry on foot. Allan ordered him to stop telegraphing, 
and told him to come to see him the moment he arrived in 
New York. 

Woolf did not realize that the ax had been sharpened for 
him already. He hoped to be able to conduct the inquiry 
himself and to find some way out. Possibly Easmussen’s 
death might be his saving. To save himself he was ready to 
stick at nothing, however rascally. He would make up to 
Easmussen’s family for anything he might have to say against 
the other^s reputation. 

The moment the steamer arrived at Hoboken, Woolf got 
into his car and drove to Wall Street. He at once asked to 
see Allan. 

Allan kept him waiting, five minutes, ten minutes, a quarter 
of an hour. Woolf was disturbed. With every minute he 
had to wait, some of the courage he had worked up oozed 
out. When at last he was shown into Allan^s room he dis- 
guised his nervousness by affecting the asthmatic cough to 
which he was liable. 

His top-hat on the back of his head, a cigar in his mouth, 
253 


254 : 


THE TUHISTEL 


he walked in and began talking at once. ^^You keep your 
people waiting, Mr. Allan, I must say,’^ he remonstrated, with 
an oily laugh, and he took his hat off to wipe his forehead. 

How goes it with you ? 

Allan rose from his seat. Oh, here you are, Woolf!’’ 
he said, quietly, in a voice free from expression of any 
kind, and he looked about for something on his writing- 
table. 

Allan’s tones reassured Woolf for a moment until it was 
borne in on him that he had been addressed as Woolf instead 
of as Mr. Woolf. It had once been one of his greatest wishes 
that Allan should talk to him thus familiarly, but now it 
did not seem a good omen. 

He sank into an arm-chair, bit off the end of a new cigar 
BO violently that the sound of his teeth meeting could be 
heard, and lit it. 

^^This is a sad business about Rasmussen, Mr. Allan?” 
he began, panting for breath, the match still in his hand. He 
waved it about now until it went out, then threw it on the 
floor. Such an extraordinarily gifted fellow ! Such a pity ! 
He would have brought off a really splendid thing for us. 
Gad, he would! As I telegraphed to you, I guarantee Ras- 
mussen’s honesty.” 

He broke off, Allan’s gaze having suddenly met his. 
Allan’s look was cold — that was all. But it was so devoid of 
aU human sympathy, or even interest, that it had an alarming 
effect, and Woolf’s mouth closed. 

Rasmussen is another story,” answered Allan, in business- 
like tones, and he took up a bundle of telegrams from the 
desk. We’ll keep to the point, I think, and talk about you, 
Woolf!” 

Woolf felt chilled to the bone. 

He bent forward, his lips twitching, and nodded like a man 
who admits his guilt, and then he took in a deep breath, and 
said earnestly, have already telegraphed to you, Mr. 
Allan, that I had bad luck on this occasion. I bought the 
wool a week too soon. I allowed myself to be hurried into 
it by my Liverpool agent — idiot that the fellow is. The 


CALLED TO ACCOUNT 


255 


tin I bought too late. I regret the loss, but it can easily be 
made good. Believe me, Mr. Allan, it is not very pleasant for 
me to have to confess that in this case I have made a mess of 
things.” 

He rose with difficulty from the chair, breathing hard, and 
laughed constrainedly. 

But Allan was in no mood for laughter. He made an im- 
patient movement with his head. Internally he was boiling 
with rage and indignation. He had never so loathed any 
one as he loathed this hairy asthmatic Jew at that moment. 
Now that after a year of hard effort he had at last succeeded 
in getting once again on solid ground, this rascally crook of a 
stock-jobber must upset him. He had no reason to let him 
off easily, and he went for him ruthlessly. ‘^That is not 
the question,” he said quietly, only the quivering of his nostrils 
betraying the intensity of his feeling. ‘^The Syndicate will 
indemnify you for any losses you may have made speculating 
on its account. But” — and Allan took his hands off the 
desk, upon which he had been leaning, and stood up straight, 
fixing on Woolf eyes which now looked black and almost 
murderous — ‘^Your last year’s balance was a fraud, sir! 
A fraud! You have been speculating on your own account, 
and have lost seven million dollars.” 

Woolf sank back in his chair. He was ashen-gray. His 
features twitched. He put his fieshy hand on his heart and 
gasped for breath. His mouth remained open, and his blood- 
shot eyes started out of his head. 

Allan changed color, going red and white alternately in 
his efforts to control himself. Then he went on in the same 
quiet, cold accents: ‘‘You can look at these for yourself,” 
as he threw the bundle of telegrams down on the floor at 
Woolfs feet. 

Woolf still lay back in the chair gasping for breath. The 
ground seemed to have given beneath him. The heavy lids 
sank over his eyes. He saw nothing but a whirling darkness 
as of night ... At last he came to himself. 

“ Allan ! ” he began, conscious now that no lie could help 
him. 


256 


THE TUNNEL 


Allan remained silent. 

Our position was desperate, Allan, Woolf gasped out. 
" It was a question of getting money — money at any price ! 

Allan was losing his self-control. He had no pity for this 
wretch, nothing hut loathing and scorn. He would finish 
with him once and for all. He went white to the lips as he 
made answer: 

‘^You have paid a million and a half into the Buda-Pest 
Bank in the name of Wolfisohn, more than a million in Lon- 
don, and two or three millions to other banks. You have been 
using our money for your own speculations, and now you 
have done for yourself. I give you till six to-morrow morn- 
ing. At six exactly I shall have you arrested.’^ 

Woolf staggered to his feet, his whole body trembling, great 
beads of perspiration rolling down his face. His eyes me- 
chanically took in the names of various European banks ajfixed 
to the telegraph forms. Should he try to explain to Allan 
why he had gone in for these speculations? Should he at- 
tempt to explain his motives, and show that it was not from 
mere greed for gold? But Allan had too simple a nature to 
understand how a man could long for power. Allan had ac- 
quired power without longing for it or striving for it. It had 
come to him unsought. This mechanician had only three 
ideas in his head, and had never troubled to think about the 
world and its problems. Even if he could be made to under- 
stand, he would be like a wall of granite. He would stand 
inflexibly for that middle-class notion of honor which was 
well enough in small things, but sheer imbecility in matters 
of real importance. No, Allan would not condemn him and 
despise him any the less. Allan ! This same Allan who had 
the lives of five thousand men upon his conscience and who 
had taken thousands of millions from the people without 
knowing for certain that he could fulfill his promises. Allan’s 
turn would come too — ^let him look out! . . . Woolf’s brain 
began once more to seek for some way of escape. 

For several seconds he remained lost in thought, oblivious 
to his surroundings. He did not hear Allan ordering a 
servant to bring a glass of water as Mr. Woolf was feeling ill. 


CALLED TO ACCOUNT 


257 


He did not come to himself until Lion stood by him and 
offered him the glass. 

He drank it to the last drop, breathed deeply and looked 
again at Allan. Allan seemed less formidable to him now. 
Supposing he could say something that would soften his 
heart. Mastering himself, he spoke again : Listen, Allan, 

you cannot be in earnest. Here we are — ^you and I. We have 
been working together for seven, eight years. I have earned 
millions for the Syndicate 

That was your business.’’ 

Certainly. But listen, I admit it was wrong. But it 
wasn’t merely for the money. I can explain my motives to 
you. I want you to understand them ... No, you can’t 
mean it, Allan. The matter can be arranged — and I am the 
only man who can arrange it. . . . If you do for me, you do 
for the Sjmdicate.” 

Allan was aware that Woolf was right in this. The seven 
millions might go to the devil, but the scandal was a catas- 
trophe. But he remained obdurate. 

That is my affair,” he replied. 

Woolf shook his great, buffalo-like head. He could not 
grasp it. Allan could not really intend to do for him. It was 
unthinkable. He looked again into Allan’s eyes inquiringly, 
only to be convinced that here was a man from whom he could 
expect no mercy. He was up against a stronger man than 
himself — a born American. He, the naturalized American, 
stood no chance against him. 

Allan ! ” he cried in his desperation. You are driving 
me to my death ! You can’t intend to drive me to my death.” 

I have nothing more to say to you,” Allan replied, moving 
towards the door. 

I will give back all the money,” Woolf shrieked, gesticu- 
lating wildly. 

Allan left the room, and the door shut with a bang. 

Woolf, still trembling from head to foot, took his hat. 
Allan was in the adjoining room and would hear him if he 
called. He opened his mouth, but no sound came. It didn’t 
matter. It would have been no good. 


^58 


THE TUNNEL 


He went out, his teeth chattering with rage and fright, his 
eyes suffused with blood. Curse that fellow Allan ! But his 
hour would come too ! 

His car was waiting for him. Eiverside Drive ! ” 

The chauffeur had glanced at his face as he gave the order. 

Woolf is ruined,^^ he thought to himself. 

Woolf crouched in his car, seeing and hearing nothing. 
The ice-cold sweat on his skin chilled him to the bone. He 
nestled in under his wraps like an animal in its lair. He 
had a feeling of nausea in his mouth. He’s done for me,” 
he kept saying, he’s done for me.” 

Night came on and the chauffeur asked whether he should 
not drive homewards. 

Woolf seemed lost in thought. At last he said in an expres- 
sionless voice, Hundred and Tenth.” 

It was the address of Kenee, bis mistress of the moment. 
He had no one to whom he could talk, no friend, no acquaint- 
ance even, so he went to her. 

Woolf feared lest he might have betrayed himself to his 
chauffeur. He pulled himself together now. When they 
reached Eenee’s house he got out and said in a voice as matter 
of fact as ever, and with a touch of his usual peremptoriness : 
^^Wait.” 

But the chauffeur said to himself. ^^All the same, he’s 
done for.” 

Een4e made no signs whatever of being glad to see him 
back. She was in a sulky mood, feeling bored to death and 
miserable. She was so much taken up with herself and her 
annoyances, that she did not notice that there was anything 
wrong with him. 

Woolf was so tickled by this proof of her self-absorption 
that he laughed out loud at it, and his laughter — for all that 
it had a vein of desperation underlying it — brought him back 
into the mood in which he was wont to talk with Eenee. He 
talked French with her. The language made a different man 
of him. For a few — a very few — seconds, he seemed to forget 
that he was a condemned man. He joked with her, called 
her his spoilt child,” and, with his cold, damp lips kissed 


CALLED TO ACCOUNT 


259 


her on her charming, girlish mouth. Een6e was extraordi- 
narily pretty, a fair-haired French beauty from Lille. He 
had seen her in Paris during the previous year and had im- 
ported her. He told her now that he had brought her a 
marvel in the way of a cloak and beautiful feathers from 
Paris, and her face lit up with pleasure. She ordered the 
table to be laid and began to chatter about all her moods 
and fancies. 

Oh, she detested New York, she detested all these Americans 
— all so polite to women but at heart so indifferent to them. 
She wished to heaven she were back in Paris earning her living 
as a modiste. 

‘^Well, perhaps you will be able to go back, Eenee,” said 
Woolf with a smile, which broadened as he watched her face. 
They sat down to their meal, but he could eat nothing. He 
drank large quantities of Burgundy, drank till his head grew 
hot. 

Let’s have some music and dancing, Eenee,” he cried. 
Eenee telephoned to a Hungarian restaurant in the Jewish 
quarter, and in half an hour the dancers and musicians ar- 
rived. 

Woolf promised the performers a hundred dollars on condi- 
tion that they never stopped for a moment. Without a pause 
they alternated songs and dances and music. Woolf lay back 
on the sofa like a corpse, only his gleaming eyes showing 
signs of life. He kept pouring down great draughts of red 
wine and yet did not get drunk. Eenee sat crouched up in 
an arm-chair, a beautiful scarlet shawl wrapped round her, 
her greenish eyes half closed, and looking like a red panther. 
She always looked bored to death. Woolf had been fascinated 
by her matchless indolence. But if any one disturbed her, 
she would flash out like a devil. 

The pretty young Hungarian would have charmed Woolf at 
any other time. But to-night neither her beauty nor the 
music nor the wine could solace his restlessness. At eleven 
o’clock Woolf dismissed the dancers and took leave of Eenee, 
without even troubling to give his usual excuse that he must 
go and work.” 


260 


THE TUNNEL 


Eeturning to his own house he drank a cognac and walked 
up and down his brilliantly lit sitting-room. Stopping in 
front of a small lacquer-work cabinet, he opened it. It con- 
tained a number of locks of hair, blond, golden, red, auburn. 
Every lock had its label, like a medicine bottle. Each label 
was dated. Woolf looked at them all and laughed out loud 
scornfully. Like all men who have much to do with women 
who sell themselves, he had nothing but contempt for the sex. 

But the sound of his own laughter startled him. It re- 
minded him of a laugh he had heard somewhere. He remem- 
bered presently that it was an uncle of his who had laughed 
BO — an uncle whom he had detested. That was strange. 

He continued to walk up and down. The walls and the 
furniture got on his nerves. He could bear the loneliness no 
longer. He would go to his club. 

It was three o’clock in the morning now. The streets were 
empty. At the club, members were playing poker at three 
tables, and at one of them Woolf took his place. It was 
wonderful what cards he held. Everything went his way. 
Soon he had won two thousand dollars. At six o’clock the 
game was abandoned and Woolf went home on foot. Two 
men with spades on their shoulders walked behind him talking. 
Another workman, much the worse for liquor, was rolling 
along the street singing and shouting inarticulately. 

Arrived at his house, Woolf drank a glass of whisky so 
strong that he became half dazed. He had a hot bath and fell 
asleep in it, awaking only when his servant became anxious 
and knocked at the door. He dressed and went out. It was 
now broad daylight. A motor-car was standing near by and 
Woolf hailed it. But it was engaged. He walked down the 
street, followed by a man who kept on the other side — one of 
Allan’s detectives, he surmised. Thinking to escape him 
Woolf jumped suddenly on a car that was passing. 

He drank coffee in a saloon and wandered about the streets 
during the morning. 

New York was in the full swing of its daily twelve-hour 
race. Everybody and everything was in a rush. Woolf had 
a sensation of being left behind. He quickened his pace, but 


CALLED TO ACCOUNT 


261 


still everything and everybody seemed to rush past him. 
Manhattan, the heart of New York, was sucking them all in 
and shooting them all out by a thousand veins and arteries. 
He felt himself merely one of myriads of molecules. Every 
five minutes he was passed by an immense gray motor omni- 
bus, in which a man could swallow down a brea^ast sandwich 
and cup of coffee on his way to office. Woolffs eye was caught 
continually by the bold aggressive advertisements which di- 
versified the scene. Certainly advertising had grown into a 
fine art. He smiled, momentarily forgetting his troubles. 

From the Battery he saw three lemon-colored advertising 
aeroplanes cruising over the bay one after another, carrying 
for the benefit of possible purchasers on their way into the 
city the exciting announcement: ‘^Wanamaker Eemnant 
Day!^^ 

Who, of all the thousands all around him, would remember 
that it was he who invented this kind of aerial advertising 
twelve years ago? 

Woolf wandered about hour after hour until he came to 
Central Park, dizzy and stupefied, incapable of thought. 

It began to rain and the park was deserted. He almost 
fell asleep. 

He shuffled along, his head bent, his legs giving under him, 
looking like his old father, whom the fates had reduced to 
such poverty. He seemed to hear a voice within him saying ; 

The son of the old washer of corpses.^^ 

Now he was wide awake again. Where was he? In Cen- 
tral Park. What had brought him here? Why had he not 
escaped from New York and gone thousands of miles away? 
He looked at his watch. It was a few minutes after five. 
So he had nearly an hour, for Allan was a man of his word. 

He began to consider things seriously. He had five thou- 
sand dollars on him. He could go a long distance on that. 
He would get away at once. Allan should not have him. 
He had succeeded in. shaking off Allan’s detectives. This was 
a comfort to him. He went into a barber’s shop and had his 
beard shaved off, making his plans the while. The shop was 
in Columbus Circle. He would go to One Hundred and 


262 


THE TUNNEL 


Twenty-fifth Street by the subway and then take whatever 
train suited best. 

At ten minutes to six he left the barber’s. He bought 
some cigars and went down into the subway at seven minutes 
to the hour. 

To his surprise he saw waiting here a man whom he knew, 
a fellow passenger on his voyage back to New York. This 
man saw him, but fortunately did not recognize him. Yet 
they had played poker together in the smoking-room every 
day. 

An express dashed in, filling the station with noise and 
smoke. Woolf became impatient and looked at his watch. 
Eive minutes to. 

Suddenly he noticed that his acquaintance had disappeared. 
Looking round, he saw him standing at the back, deep in the 
Herald. A sudden fear seized Woolf, and he trembled in 
every limb. Supposing this man who had traveled with him 
all the way from Cherbourg were one of Allan’s detectives? 
Three minutes to six. Woolf took some steps to one side, 
glancing furtively at the man as he did so. He continued to 
hold up the paper, but it was slightly torn, and in the aperture 
Woolf caught a glimpse of an eye. 

His heart throbbed. The game was up. The train had 
started. Woolf threw himself on the rails in front of it. 
The man who had been watching him rushed forward to pull 
him back. Too late I 


VIII 


THE SPECTER 

Half an hour later the whole of Hew York was thrilled by 
the cries : 

Extra! Extra! Suicide of Woolf! AU about Banker 
Woolf!’’ 

The newspaper boys tore along the streets shouting, yell- 
ing— 

Woolf! Woolf! Woolf! Woolf crushed to death!” 

Every one in Hew York had known Woolf by sight. 
Every one was familiar with the appearance of his fifty horse- 
power motor-car as it went down Broadway, with its silver 
dragon emitting notes of warning deep enough in tone for an 
ocean liner. Woolf had been a feature of Hew York, and 
now he was dead. The papers that favored the S3mdicate 
headed the news : Accident or Suicide ? ” Those that were 

opposed to it had in big lettering ; " First Rasmussen ! How 
Woolf!” 

Woolf! Woolf! Woolf!” The newspaper boys went 
tearing about, unceasiugly shouting the name. 

Allan heard of the suicide five minutes after it had taken 
place. A detective told him over the telephone. 

Startled and horrified, he walked up and down his room, 
unable to work. The streets were full of mist and only the 
higher stories of the tower buildings stood out clear in the 
rays of the setting sun. As soon as he could, he got into 
communication with the head of the Press Bureau, and with 
the acting head of the financial department. 

All night long, the last interview with Woolf kept coming 
back to his mind — that last picture of him, lying back in the 
arm-chair, gasping for breath. 

263 


264 


THE TUNNEL 


He reflected on all the disasters connected with the Tunnel. 
The future looked hopeless. 

Woolf’s suicide kept thousands awake that night. Eas- 
mussen’s death had made people nervous about the Syndi- 
cate, but this new tragedy seemed to confirm the worst fears. 
The Syndicate was going to smash. All the biggest banks in 
the world were involved in its fate, to the extent of millions of 
dollars, all the great industries, all classes of the public down 
to the newspaper boys. The excitement of New York was 
transmitted all over the world from San Francisco to Petro- 
grad, from Cape Town to Sydney. Shares went down with 
a rush. Woolf’s death was the beginning of the great land- 
slide. 

A committee of the principal bondholders met and debated 
for nearly twelve hours. There were stormy scenes and re- 
sponsible and usually quiet men raged and stormed at each 
other. On the 2nd of January, the S 3 mdicate had to meet 
liabilities amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars for 
which no adequate provision had been made. 

The committee published a statement in which they made 
it known that the financial situation at the moment was 
unfavorable, but that they were not without hope of its 
being shortly improved. This necessarily guarded statement 
indicated the fatal condition of affairs quite clearly. 

Next day ten dollar shares could be bought for a dollar. 
Countless individuals who had been bitten ” by the specula- 
tion years before were ruined. 

There was a run upon the banks. Not only were those 
banks besieged which were known to be deeply involved with 
the Syndicate, but also many others which had no connection 
with it whatever. It was the worst thing since the crisis of 
1907. Some of the smaller establishments went to smash at 
once, and even the big houses tottered. They tried in vain 
to soothe the minds of people by reassuring announcements in 
the newspapers. Immense sums had to be paid out. Offices 
had to be kept open all night in order to cope with the rush. 
The price of gold rose by leaps and bounds. Eates of in- 
terest beat all records. The New York City Bank was sup- 


THE SPECTER 


265 


ported by Gould, Lloyd’s bank was able to hold its own, the 
‘^American” was backed by a great London bank — ^the only 
European bank which came to the rescue at all, all the others 
maintaining an attitude of self-defense. The money markets 
of blew York, Paris, London, Berlin and Vienna were all 
thrown into complete confusion and dismay. No day passed 
without its victims. Firm after firm of stockbrokers sus- 
pended payment, well-known financiers decamped or com- 
mitted suicide, big industries put up the shutters. 

Panic everywhere ! In France, England, Germany, Austria, 
and Russia. Germany was the first to suffer, and within a 
week was almost as much a prey to alarm as America itself. 

The industries which had thriven most on the Tunnel — iron, 
steel, copper, coal, and machinery — ^were, of course, those 
which were hardest hit. Hundreds of thousands of laborers 
were thrown out of work. Hundreds of thousands of others 
went on strike, determined to fight this time to the bitter 
end and not to listen to smooth words and mere promises that 
would be broken the moment the employer found it conveni- 
ent. 

The great strike broke out in Lille, Clermont-Ferrand and 
St. Etienne, and spread thence in every direction. It soon 
extended to England, Italy, Spain, Canada and the States. 
Entire cities were threatened with starvation. Furnaces be- 
came extinct, mines flooded, fleets of steamers lay idle. Every 
day brought new tidings of disaster. Railways, electric power 
stations, gas factories lacked coal. Not one-tenth of the usual 
trains were now running, and the Atlantic traffic was almost at 
a standstill. 

Outbreaks of violence now began, first in Westphalia then 
in the London Docks. This was on December 8th. The 
streets by the West India Docks were strewn that evening with 
the bodies of dead and wounded, policemen as well as laborers. 
On the 10th a general strike was proclaimed throughout Eng- 
land and France, while Germany, Russia and Italy followed 
suit shortly afterwards. 

War had definitely broken out between Capital and Labor 
all the world over. 


266 


THE TUNNEL 


All the terrible consequences of such a war soon became 
manifest. The mortality of infants and young children multi- 
plied appallingly. Everywhere there was a scarcity of food, 
provisions were allowed to rot away in trains and cargo 
vessels. As Christmas approached the great capitals were 
threatened with famine, and were almost entirely without 
artificial light. Men and women froze in their dwellings, 
and the weak and sickly died off in thousands. Every day 
brought its tale of murders and robberies. The specter of 
Eevolution hung over the world. 

In the midst of all this turmoil and tragedy, the Tunnel 
Syndicate still lived. It was a shattered wreck, but it still 
lived. 

This was Lloyd^s achievement. He had called together a 
meeting of all its strongest supporters, and had addressed them 
himself — the first time he had spoken in this way, on account 
of his physical ailments, for over twenty years. The Syndi- 
cate must not fall, he told them. The times were desperate 
and its fall would result in world-wide disaster, more awful 
than anything they had yet witnessed. The general strike 
could not last, as things were, more than two or three weeks, 
as the workmen would be starving. The crisis could be 
brought to an end by the New Year. But sacrifices must be 
made to this end. Those present must make up their mind to 
find the money required at once. Bondholders and share- 
holders must be paid every cent due to them on J anuary 2nd, 
if the Syndicate was to be saved. 

Lloyd himself set an example. The day was won. 

The meeting was a secret one. Next day the papers an- 
nounced that the Syndicate’s financial affairs had been righted 
and that all its liabilities were to be met as usual. 


IX 


SMALL CHANGE, PLEASE! 

On" New Year’s Day all the New York theaters, concert-halls 
and restaurants are wont to be full to overflowing. 

But this year everything was different. Only in a few of 
the biggest hotels was the mode of life unaltered. The street- 
cars were not working. Only at rare intervals was there a 
train running — worked by engineers — on the elevated rail- 
roads or the subways. In the harbor the ocean liners lay 
empty, and enveloped in mist. In the evening the streets were 
almost dark, only a few lamps being lit, and none of the 
electric light advertisements were in use. 

At midnight a dense crowd of men had already begun to 
congregate outside the Syndicate Building, prepared to wait 
there until the morning, when they were to recover their 
interest — there were rumors that the Syndicate would close 
its doors on the 3rd, and they were taking no risks. 

The night was very cold, several degrees below freezing 
point. A fine snow fell like white sand from the dense black 
sky which swallowed up the higher stories of the great struc- 
ture. Shivering, with chattering teeth, they kept shoving 
this way and that in the attempt to warm themselves, the while 
they exchanged hopes and forebodings in regard to the fate 
of the Tunnel. They were packed together so close that they 
might have slept standing, but no one so much as closed an 
eye. Their anxiety was too great. It was still on the cards 
that the doors would he closed after all in spite of announce- 
ments. If so their shares would there and then become 
worthless. 

At eight o’clock there was a sudden movement throughout 
the dense throng. The first lights had been lit inside the 
Syndicate Building. 

267 


268 


THE TUNNEL 


At nine o’clock — ^while the clock was still striking — the 
heavy chnrch-like doors of the building opened. The crowd 
flowed into the beautiful vestibule and thence into the public 
offices, brightly lit. An army of fresh, alert, dapper officials 
busied themselves behind the small office windows. The 
business of paying out the money was transacted like clock- 
work at all the pay-desks. Everything was done quickly, 
methodically. Each man, as he got his money, found himself 
moved along by those pressing after him. 

Towards ten o’clock, however, there was a partial stoppage. 
Three of the pay-desks were closed simultaneously owing to a 
scarcity of small change. This evoked alarm and the officials 
were appealed to excitedly by dozens of voices. It was an- 
nounced that the pay-desks would be closed for flve minutes. 
The public was requested to have small change ready, to save 
time. 

The situation of those waiting at the desks was anything 
but pleasant, for the pressure had increased. Hitherto, sec- 
tions of the dense mass in the central hall had been released 
regularly as the money was paid out, but now that there was 
no outlet it had become crammed in every corner. If those 
who were already in allowed themselves to be pushed on and 
out of the other door, all their ten hours of waiting would 
have been lost and they would have had to come back after 
all the thousands now pushing their way in from out- 
side. They were in no humor for trifling. They shouted and 
yelled. 

The excitement increased. 

• Suddenly the pay-desks opened again, and the clerks began 
again to hand out money as quickly as before. But it was 
too late. The news that payment had been interrupted had 
had its effect outside, and thousands of now frenzied men 
were flghting their way in. The crowd was so great that 
egress became impossible. The doors began to crack and 
give, and in another minute the clerks and officials took flight, 
the mob surging into the counting house over the broken 
debris of the pay-desks, and out of it through all the many 
doors. After them came a 'fresh crowd stumbling through 


SMALL CHANGE, PLEASE! 


269 


scattered piles of papers, overturned desks, heaps of coins, 
shouting and cursing and vowing vengeance. 

One thing alone was clear to all — their money was lost 1 
Their money 1 Their hopes 1 Everything 1 

The whole building was now in an uproar. The enraged 
mob set themselves to smash everything within reach — win- 
dows, tables, chairs. They forced their way upstairs into the 
upper stories. 

The building, as it happened, was almost empty. It had 
been decided some time before to economize by vacating all 
the floors that were not absolutely required, and to sublet 
them. Most of the offices had been already transferred to 
Mac City, others were being made ready for the new tenants. 

The second and third floors were fllled with letter-files, 
files of accounts, plans, and so forth, which it was intended to 
remove during this first week of the New Year. 

The mob in its rage began to hurl these things out of the 
window into the street and into the elevators and the elevator 
shafts. 

Three young mechanics, more venturesome than the rest, 
took possession of the lift and made their way up to Allan^s 
room on the thirty-second floor. As the three reached Allan’s 
room he came out of the door. 

What do you want ? ” he asked. 

“We want our money ! ” 

“ Go to hell 1 ” And Allan slammed the door in their 
faces. 

They stood staring at the door, entirely taken aback. This 
was not at all what they had intended. And they decided to 
beat a retreat. 

As they descended in the elevator, it looked indeed as though 
they were going, if not to hell, to purgatory. At the twelfth 
story they found themselves enveloped in smoke, and at the 
eighth they saw great tongues of flame. The Syndicate 
Building was on fire 1 


X 


PIEE! 

Xo one knew how it happened or whose doing it was ! 

A man suddenly appeared on a window-sill on the third 
floor. Holding both his hands up to his mouth to serve as a 
megaphone he shouted out to the crowd below at the top of 
his voice, Fire ! Fire ! The building is on fire ! Get back ! ” 

It was a bank clerk named James Blackstone. At first 
nobody could make out what he was saying, amid the din. 
But, presently, as he kept on shouting one and another began 
to realize. And they realized that what looked like mist up 
above was really smoke. Now it became thicker and darker. 
There could no longer be any doubt about it. The great 
building was on fire. 

There were thousands of men? still inside, rushing about in 
their wild fury, but now they came streaming down pell-mell 
over the granite steps into the street. Most of them had seen 
the terrifying sight of the burning lifts laden with bundles of 
paper, the fiames shooting up into the higher stories. 

The crowd in the street continued to watch Blackstone on 
his window-sill. Now he was moving, he seemed to grow 
bigger — ^he had jumped! He fell on a dense group of men 
who had rushed down the steps. It was a wonder none of 
them were killed. Blackstone was lifted and carried away — 
he had only dislocated one of his feet. 

From Blackstone’s first shout until his jump no more than 
five minutes had elapsed. Ten minutes later Pine Street, 
Wall Street, Thomas Street, Cedar, Nassau Street and Broad- 
way were full of fire-engines and ambulance cars. 

Kelly, the Head of the Fire Department, realized at once the 
great danger to the entire business quarter and he requisi- 
tioned more engines from Brooklyn, a step which had not 

270 


PIRE! 


271 


been taken since the great fire in the Equitable Buildings. 

The northern passage of Brooklyn Bridge was blocked, and 
eight fire-engines shot over the suspension bridge to Manhat- 
tan. 

The Syndicate Building was now emitting smoke like a 
gigantic oven. 

The burning elevators had each at a certain point in their 
ascent come to a stop and then fallen headlong to the base- 
ment, sending out great showers of sparks as they did so. In 
the vestibule, explosions could be heard coming from the 
shaft like the discharge of cannon. Now all that remained 
of the burning papers went sweeping upwards to the dome of 
glass, which burst in the heat. A great volume of flame 
escaped skywards like the eruption of a volcano. 

High above it, circling round and round like some great 
eagle whose eyrie was on fire, was an aeroplane. An Edison- 
Bio cinematographer was on board, busily taking records of 
the exciting scene, with its picturesque background of snow- 
covered sky-scrapers. 


XI 


ALLAN ESCAPES 

Allan- escaped on to the roof of the Mercantile Cafe Com- 
pany, which lay eight stories below him. 

A few minutes after the appearance of the three young 
artisans, he had discovered that the building was on fire. 
When Lion came in with the news, trembling with fear and 
excitement, he began to snatch up papers from the tables, and 
shove them into his pockets. 

He threw Lion some keys. Open the safe,^^ he ordered, 
‘^and don^t worry. The building is fireproof.” He was 
deadly pale. This new and final disaster overwhelmed him. 

This is the end of everything,” he said to himself. 

The whole catologue of mishaps and catastrophes came 
back to his memory. He continued mechanically, hardly 
knowing what he did, to collect together the drawings and 
plans and documents of all sorts lying about the room. 

The telephone bell rang. It was Kelly calling up to tell 
Allan that he must get down on the Mercantile Cafe Com- 
pany’s roof at once. 

Allan went on gathering things together, and handing them 
to Lion to put in the safe. 

Lion was almost mad with fright, but dared not disobey. 
There were warnings of a terrible storm in his master’s set 
face. 

Suddenly there was a knock at the door, and the Eusso- 
German Strom entered the room. He was wearing a short 
overcoat, and stood with his hat in his hand. He stood like 
a man determined to wait patiently, resolute of purpose, but 
not importunate. ‘^It is time to get away, Mr. Allan,” he 
said. Allan wondered how Strom had got there, but he 
couldn’t stop now to think that out. He remembered that 

272 


ALLA^^- ESCAPES 


273 


Strom was in N’ew York to discuss with him the shrinkage 
in their corps of engineers. 

You go on, Strom/^ he said, I shall follow.’’ And he 
went on picking up the papers. Looking up presently he 
saw Strom still standing near the door. Still there ? ” he 
exclaimed. 

am waiting for you, Mr. Allan,” Strom replied in his 
quiet, resolute tone of voice. 

Suddenly a great cloud of smoke blew into the room, and 
a white-helmeted chief of the Fire Department made his ap- 
pearance. Kelly has sent me to tell you, Mr. Allan,” he 
said, that in another five minutes you won’t be able to get 
down to the roof.” 

I want exactly five minutes more,” Allan replied, still 
working energetically. 

At this moment they heard the click of an instantaneous 
shutter, and a photographer was discovered busy with his 
camera. 

How did you come here ? ” cried the Fire Chief, aston- 
ished. 

I climbed up after you,” was the reply. 

Allan could not help bursting out laughing. Kow, Lion,” 
he shouted a few seconds later. Come along, we must clear 
out.” 

The corridor was black with dense vapor. They had no 
time to lose. One by one they got out on the roof. On 
three sides of it angry columns of smoke went rushing up, 
entirely obscuring the view. The photographer hustled round 
with his camera, snapshotting everything. 

To the eyes of those watching anxiously from neighboring 
windows, the descent seemed even more dangerous than it 
really was. 

The roof of the Mercantile Cafe Company looked like a 
glacier. As they reached it, Kelly walked up to Allan. 
They were old friends. I am glad I got you down, Mac,” 
he said. Thanks, Bill,” Allan answered. The words were 
reproduced that evening in all the papers. 


XII 


HUNTED 

It had been one of the biggest fires on record in New York, 
but, strange to say, only six men lost their lives in it. 

While the smoke was still whirling in clouds over the city, 
and bits of charred paper still kept falling from the gray 
sky, the newspapers came out with illustrated descriptions 
of the burning building, and of Kelly^s band of heroes, to- 
gether with portraits of the victims. 

The Syndicate was obviously completely done for. Tens 
of thousands of letters and plans of the utmost value had been 
burned. The annual meeting of shareholders was due on the 
first Tuesday in January — four days after the fire. The 
Directors had no option but to admit failure. 

That evening a mob of roughs gathered round the Central 
Park Hotel, where Allan had his quarters, and began to shout 
and yell. The manager became nervous, and showed Allan 
letters which he had received threatening to destroy the 
building if Allan remained in it. 

Allan handed them back with a bitter smile. ‘^I under- 
stand,’^ he said. He moved across to the Palace Hotel under 
an assumed name. Next day he had to move again. Three 
days later there wasn’t a hotel in New York that dared to 
take him in. Hotels which not long before would have 
given him precedence before reigning princes now closed 
their doors against him. 

He could not go to the Tunnel City, for threats had been 
made that it would be set on fire if he did, so he betook him- 
self to Buffalo by a night train. The steel works were under 
police protection. They were no longer his property, how- 
ever, for he had disposed of them to Brown, the famous 
millionaire. 


274 


HUNTED 


275 


From Buffalo lie was obliged to move on to Chicago, but 
here also he was in danger. He stayed for a few days with 
Vanderstyfft in Ohio, but three granaries on Yanderstyfffs 
model farm were set on fire, and fearing other such demon- 
strations, he took his leave. 

At last he found a haven in Canada. Ethel Lloyd wrote 
to him on her father’s behalf placing his Manitoba place. 
Turtle Kiver, at Allan’s disposal. Papa will be very glad,” 
she said, ‘^if you will stay there as long as you like. You 
will have some trout fishing, and there are good horses for 
you to ride. I recommend ‘Teddy’ to you in particular. 
We shall join you there in the summer. New York has 
already begun to quiet down.” 

The sensational newspapers, unable to trace his whereabouts, 
jumped to the conclusion that he had made away with himself, 
and came out with headlines to the effect that the Tunnel had 
“ done for him ” too. 

But those who knew him best prophesied that he would 
presently reappear in New York. And he did so sooner 
than any one expected. 

The wreck of the Syndicate had involved absolute ruin to 
great numbers, but the final disaster had not been fatal to 
so many as those which had preceded it. The actual bank- 
ruptcy had been anticipated, and things generally were in 
such a terrible condition already that they could not be 
made much worse. The progress of the world seemed to have 
been thrown back twenty years. Industry was at a standstill 
everywhere. 

On the Missouri and the Amazon, as on the Volga and the 
Congo, steamers and barges lay empty and idle. Workhouses 
and asylums of all kinds were overcrowded. Everywhere 
there was bitter poverty, hunger, and misery. 

Economic causes lay at the back of all this, and it was 
folly to assert that Allan was responsible, but the newspapers 
never ceased to hold him to blame. Day after day they 
continued to accuse him of having swindled the people out of 
their money by his false promises. After seven years’ work 
only one-third of the Tunnel was built. He could never in 


276 


THE TUNNEI/ 


his heart have believed that the whole work would be com- 
pleted within fifteen years. 

At last, in the middle of February, a warrant was made 
out for his arrest on the definite charge of having consciously 
misled the investors. 

Two days later Hew York resounded with the cry: Mac 

Allan comes back! Mac Allan arrested!” 

The liquidators of the Syndicate, and Lloyd also, urged 
Allan to be cautious, but he threw caution to the winds. 
While confined in the Tombs Prison he received daily visits 
of some hours’ duration from Strom, in whose hands he had 
left the control of the Tunnel. 

Allan worked strenuously, and the time passed speedily for 
him. He set himself to planning out the completion of the 
Tunnel on the basis of a single gallery. He saw nobody ex- 
cept Strom and his legal advisers. 

Ethel Lloyd called on one occasion, but he refused to see her. 

The trial lasted three weeks, and covered the whole history 
of the enterprise and of all its disasters. 

Ethel Lloyd was present throughout the proceedings, listen- 
ing eagerly to ever^^hing. 

Allan’s appearance caused much sensation and some sur- 
prise. People expected to see him looking a broken man, 
an object for pity. But he seemed as well as ever. He held 
himself erect, his face was calm and strong. He spoke quietly, 
slowly, in his wonted concise, downright American fashion, 
which served sometimes to recall the fact that he had started 
life as pony boy on Uncle Tom.” 

There was great excitement also when Hobby was called 
into the witness-box. Could this gray-haired man be the 
once elegant and frivolous Hobby who had ridden down 
Broadway on an elephant ? 

The crux of the whole case lay in the question of the fifteen 
years estimated for the building of the Tunnel. 

Had Allan felt honestly convinced that the work could be 
completed within that period? 

Every one expected Allan to reply in the affirmative. His 
four counsel were dumbstruck by his reply. 


HUNTED 


277 


No, he had not felt convinced. He had hoped, however, 
that with favorable conditions it would be completed within 
that period. 

The speeches of counsel took two whole days. Then came 
the fateful day when the jury must give their verdict. They 
dared not declare Allan not guilty. They had no anxiety 
to be blown up by dynamite, or to be shot on the thresholds 
of their homes. They declared him guilty of consciously 
misleading the public. Allan was condemned to an imprison- 
ment of six years and three months. 

It was an American verdict, unintelligible to Europe. It 
was given under the pressure of the feeling of the public and 
the conditions of the moment, and political motives had 
their influence in it. The elections were imminent, and the 
Eepublican Administration was anxious to placate the Demo- 
cratic Party. Allan heard the verdict calmly, and at once 
lodged an appeal. 

In the meantime he was taken to the Federal Peniten- 
tiary in Atlanta. 

In June the Court of Appeals had the case brought before 
it. The verdict was not reversed, and Allan was taken back 
to Atlanta. 

There remained the Supreme Court. After several months 
the case came up for its final hearing. Things were serious 
now. 

Fortunately the financial crisis had partially subsided, and 
business had been showing signs of improvement. Feeling 
was no longer as bitter as it had been. There were a hundred 
signs that Allan’s case would now go in his favor. 

Allan’s appearance on this occasion evoked fresh surprise, 
for now he looked thin and ill, and there were heavy lines 
on his forehead. His hair had become gray over the temples, 
and there was no light in his eyes. He seemed utterly in- 
different as to his fate. 

The excitement attendant on the previous trials had not 
affected him, but the imprisonment in Atlanta had under- 
mined his health. A man of his stamp could not thrive when 
withdrawn from active life; he went rusty, as it were, like 


278 


THE TUNNEL 


a machine out of use. He grew restless and could not sleep. 
He began to have dreadful dreams — hideous nightmares, full 
of all kinds of horrors connected with the Tunnel and its 
disasters. Once he dreamed that he saw Woolfs body cut 
into three pieces, each of them alive and beseeching him for 
forgiveness. 

The Supreme Court decided in his favor, and his release 
was the occasion of great rejoicing. Ethel Lloyd was again 
present in court, and waved her pocket-handkerchief about 
triumphantly. Allan had to be guarded on his way to his 
car, there was such a rush to greet him and congratulate 
him. The streets rang with cries of ‘‘Mac Allan! Mac 
Allan!” 

The wind had changed indeed ! 

Allan had now but one idea — ^to be alone, and to think out 
his plans for himself. 

He betook himself to Mac City. 


PART VI 


t 


i , 




PAET VI 


I 

FIGHTING ALONE 
The Tunnel was dead. 

A step sounded like a knell in the empty galleries — a voice 
re-echoed as in a cellar. In the stations the machines hummed 
monotonously by day and night, attended by silent, em- 
bittered engineers. Solitary trains clattered in and out. 
Only in the submarine cutting, where the workmen of the 
Pittsburg Refining and Smelting Company were, was there 
bustle. Tunnel Town was forsaken, buried in dust, extinct. 
The air which once thundered with the milling stones of 
the cement-mixing machines and the steam hammers was 
still — the earth no longer trembled. In the port lay rows 
of disused steamships. In the galleries, machines which had 
once sparkled like fairy palaces were blackened, lifeless ruins. 
The harbor searchlight was extinguished. 

Allan lived on the third floor of the works. His windows 
looked out upon a sea of lines which stretched, unused and 
covered in dust, far into the distance. During the first weeks 
he did not even leave the building. Then he spent some time 
in the galleries. He associated with no one but Strom. 
Hobby had deserted his country house some time before. He 
had given up his profession, and bought a farm in Maine. 
In November, Allan had a three hours^ interview with old 
Lloyd, and at that meeting his last hopes were dashed to the 
ground. Disheartened and embittered, he boarded a sea- 
going steamer belonging to the Syndicate. The call which 
he made at the various ports was barely mentioned in the 
newspapers, and no one troubled to read the notices. Mac 


28 ^ 


THE TUHHEL 


Allan was as dead as the Tunnel — new names were on the lips 
of the public. 

When, in the early spring, he returned to Mac City, not 
a soul gave him a second thought — except only Ethel Lloyd. 

She waited for him to call on her father. But as time 
passed and he did not appear, she wrote him a short, friendly 
note. 

Allan did not answer the letter. 

Ethel was surprised and hurt. She sent for the cleverest 
New York detective, and ordered him to watch Allan, and 
give her immediate information as to his doings. The very 
next day the detective gave her a precise account of him. 
Allan worked daily in the Tunnel. He usually returned to 
his rooms between eleven and twelve at night. He lived 
completely cut off from the world, and since his return he 
had not received a soul. The way to him was over Strom’s 
body, and Strom was as inexorable as a jailer. 

Towards sunset that very day Ethel arrived at the Tunnel 
town, and sent in her name to Allan. She was asked to 
speak to Mr. Strom. For this she was prepared, and had 
made her plan of action carefully. She would soon settle him. 
She had seen him when Allan’s case was on. She hated him 
and admired him at the same time. She abhorred his in- 
human frigidity and his scorn, but she delighted in his cour- 
age. To-day he would meet Ethel Lloyd! 

With her most seductive and winsome smile, she felt sure 
she would instantly dazzle and disarm Strom. 

I have the honor of speaking to Mr. Strom,” she began, 
in soft, flattering accents. My name is Ethel Lloyd, and I 
should like to see Mr. Allan.” Strom did not turn a hair. 
Neither her name, nor her silver fox furs, nor her pretty, 
smiling lips made the slightest impression upon him. Ethel 
had the humiliating feeling that he was bored to extinction 
by her visit. 

Mr. Allan is in the Tunnel, Miss Lloyd,” he said coldly. 
Against his glance and the impudence with which he lied, 
Ethel rebelled, and tore the mask of amiability from her face. 
She became white with rage. 


FIGHTING ALONE 


283 


^‘Yon lie/’ she answered, with a quiet, angry laugh. ‘^I 
have just been told that he is here.” 

Strom did not get excited. Madam, I cannot force you 
to believe me. I bid you good-day.” That was all. 

Such a thing had never yet occurred in Ethel Lloyd’s life. 
Trembling in every limb, and pale with excitement, she 
answered: ^^You will hear from me again, Mr. Strom. 
Never have I been treated as you have treated me to-day! 
But one day I shall show you the door. Do you hear?” 

When that happens, I shall make less fuss about it than 
you are doing. Miss Lloyd,” he said freezingly. 

Ethel looked into his icy eyes, and into his expressionless 
face. She wanted to teU him straight out that he was no 
gentleman, but she restrained herself, and was silent. In- 
stead, she threw him a contemptuous glance, and went. 

And as, with tears in her eyes, she hurried down the steps, 
she kept saying to herself : He has gone mad, that sphinx ! 

The Tunnel makes them all mad. Hobby, Allan — it only takes 
a couple of years for them all to become lunatics ! ” 

And Ethel cried with passion and disappointment as she 
drove back to New York. She had made up her mind to 
use all her powers against this Strom, behind whom Allan 
had entrenched himself, but the man’s impudent and chilling 
look had swept her determination on one side. She sobbed 
with anger at her weak tactics. ^^But I’ll make that man 
remember Ethel Lloyd,” she said revengefully, and laughed. 

I’ll buy up the whole Tunnel, just to have the pleasure of 
turning this fellow out. You wait and see.” 

That night at table, she sat pale and silent opposite her 
father. 

Pass Mr. Lloyd the sauce,” she said imperiously to the 
butler. Can’t you see ? ” 

And the man, who knew Ethel’s moods only too well, did 
as he was ordered without so much as blinking. 

Old Lloyd looked shyly into the cold imperious eyes of his 
pretty daughter. 

Ethel let no obstacles stand in her way. She had seen 
Allan. She had made up her mind to speak to him, and she 


284 : 


THE TUNNEL 


would do it, cost what it might. But for nothing on earth 
would she turn to Strom again. She loathed him ! And she 
was convinced that she would gain her ends. 

The following evenings the old man was forced to dine 
alone. Ethel excused herself. Every afternoon at four 
o’clock she went to Mac City, and returned by the evening 
train at half past ten. From six till nine she waited in a 
hired motor which she ordered from New York, ten steps away 
from the main entrance to the offices. Enveloped in furs, 
she sat there, shivering with cold, a strange adventurous 
excitement in her blood, ashamed of the part she was playing, 
and staring through the frozen panes, which now and then 
she breathed on to thaw. In spite of a few lamps which 
seemed to tear shimmering holes in the black night, it was 
pitch dark outside, and only the confused tangle of rails 
shone dully. Each time some one came near and passed, 
Ethel looked up sharply, and her heart beat. 

On the third evening she saw Allan for the first time. He 
came straight across the lines with a man, and she recognized 
him immediately by his walk. But the man at his side was 
Strom! The two went close by the car, and, as he passed, 
Strom turned his face towards the glittering frost-covered 
window. Ethel imagined that he had guessed who sat in 
the car, and she was afraid that he would call Allan’s at- 
tention to it. But he went straight on without saying a 
word. 

Two days later Allan came out of the Tunnel earlier than 
usual. He jumped out of a slow train and, without haste, 
crossed the lines. Nearer and nearer he came, silently and 
thoughtfully. Just as he had his foot on the entrance steps 
Ethel opened the door of the car and called him by name. 

Allan stood still for an instant, and looked round. Then 
he turned to go up the steps. Mr. Allan I ” Ethel called 
again, and hurried up to him. He stopped and looked in- 
quiringly at her veiled face. 

He wore a wide brown overcoat, a muffler, and high boots, 
which were covered in mud. His face was thin and hard. 
For an instant they stared at one another in silence. 


FIGHTING ALONE 


285 


" Miss Lloyd ? ” asked Allan in a deep, even voice. 

Ethel was embarrassed. She had but a vague remembrance 
of Allan^s voice. She hesitated to raise her veil, for she felt 
that her cheeks were crimson. Yes,’^ she said uncertainly, 
it is,’^ and she pushed it up. 

Allan looked at her with earnest, clear eyes. “What are 
you doing here?^’ he asked. 

Then Ethel regained her composure. She realized that her 
chance was lost if in this instant she did not strike the right 
note. Instinctively she did what was right. She laughed as 
lightheartedly and happily as a child, and said: “It is a 
wonder that you did not scold me, Mr. Allan! I want 
to speak to you, and as you will see nobody, for two long 
hours I have sat in this car watching for you.” 

The expression on Allan’s face did not change. But his 
voice sounded not unfriendly as he asked her to come in. 

Ethel breathed once more. The dangerous moment was 
over. She laughed again as she stepped into the lift. 

“I wrote to you,” she said, smiling. 

Allan did not look at her. “ Yes, yes, I know,” he answered 
absently, and stared at the ground. “ But, really and truly, 

at that time And Allan murmured something that she 

could not understand. At the same instant the lift stopped. 
Lion opened the door of Allan’s apartment. 

“ And here is old Lion still 1 ” exclaimed Ethel, and put out 
her hand to the thin Japanese as if to an old friend. 
“ How are you. Lion ? ” 

“ Thank you,” whispered the amazed Lion in an inaudible 
tone, and bowed, shuffling. 

Allan begged Ethel to excuse him a moment, and Lion 
showed her into a large, well heated room, and left her at 
once. Ethel unfastened her mantle and pulled oif her gloves. 
The room struck her as tasteless and uninteresting. There 
was no doubt about it that Allan had chosen the furniture 
by telephone and left all the arrangement to the upholsterer. 
The result was that the curtains were too short and that 
the window mullions were uncovered, letting three or four 
steely stars peep in. Some time elapsed. Lion came and 


S86 


THE TUNNEL 


served tea and toast. At last Allan entered. He had put 
on another suit and changed his high boots. 

“1 am at your command. Miss Lloyd/^ he said quietly, 
seating himself on the sofa. How is your father ? And 
Ethel read in his face that he did not appreciate her presence. 

Father is well, thank you,^^ she answered absently. She 
could now see Allan clearly. He had turned quite gray and 
looked years older. His sharpened features were quite still, 
stony, full of hidden bitterness and dumb obstinacy. His 
eyes were cold, without life, and did not permit of a searching 
study. Ethel had really intended to complain of Stromas 
behavior, but when she saw Allan, so changed, so estranged, 
and so distant with her, she checked her impulse. Her heart 
told her that there must be some way of getting behind this 
icy reserve. 

She adopted a friendly and confidential tone, as if they 
had once been, and still were, the best of friends. ‘^Mr. 
Allan,’^ she said, as with a bright look in her blue eyes she 
gave him her hand, ^^you donT know how glad I am to see 
you again ! She could scarcely hide her excitement. 

Allan gave her his hand, which had grown hard and coarse. 
He smiled a little, but in his eyes was a quiet, good-natured 
contempt for this kind of womanly S3rmpathy. 

Ethel did not care. Nothing would intimidate her now. 
She looked at Allan and shook her head. ‘^You don’t look 
well,” she continued. ^^The life you’re leading just now 
doesn’t suit you. I understand quite well that you needed 
peace and quiet for a time, but I don’t think too much of 
it is good for you. Don’t be angry with me for saying so. 
You require — your work — ^you miss the Tunnel! That’s 
what’s the matter ! ” 

She had hit upon the truth; she had struck the weak 
spot in Allan’s armor. He sat there and stared at her. He 
did not answer a word and made not the slightest attempt to 
interrupt her. 

Ethel had taken him by surprise, and she used his bewilder- 
ment for her own ends. She spoke so quickly and excitedly 
that it would have been impossible for him, without being 


FIGHTING ALONE 


287 


unmannerly, to interrupt her. She reproached him for cut- 
ting himself off from his friends, for burying himself alive in 
this dead city; she described her experience with Strom, she 
spoke of Lloyd, of New York, of friends and acquaintances, 
and always returned to the Tunnel. Who would complete the 
Tunnel if he didn’t? To whom would the world trust this 
duty? Apart from all that, she told him openly that it 
would aU be wasted if the work were not soon put in hand 
again . . . 

Allan’s gray eyes had grown somber and dark with the grief, 
pain and bitterness and longing that Ethel had awakened in 
them. 

Why do you say that to me ? ” he asked, with an unwilling 
glance at Ethel. 

Oh ! I know I’ve no right to speak to you so,” she an- 
swered, unless it be the right of a friend or an acquaintance. 
But I say it to you because But she could find no rea- 
son, and she went on : I am only reproaching you because 

you bury yourself alive in this room, instead of moving heaven 
and earth to finish the building of the Tunnel.” 

Allan shook his head cautiously and smiled resignedly. 

Miss Lloyd,” he answered, I can’t understand you. I 
Tiave moved heaven and earth, and I am still doing my best. 
But for the present there is no chance of the work being 
put in hand again.” 

Why not?” 

Allan gazed at her in astonishment. We’ve no money,” 
he answered curtly. 

But who can create money if you can’t ? ” Ethel retaliated 
in a hurry, with a quiet laugh. So long as you lock yourself 
up here, certainly nobody will give you money.” 

^^I’ve tried everything,” he answered, and Ethel saw she 
was beginning to weary him. 

She picked up her gloves. Have you spoken to father ? ” 
she asked. 

Allan nodded and avoided her glance. 

To Mr. Lloyd ? Certainly,” he said. 

^^Well, what then?” 


288 


THE TUNNEL 


“ Mr. Lloyd held out no hopes at all/’ he replied, looking 
at Ethel. 

Ethel laughed her lighthearted, childish laugh. 

When was that ? ” she said. 

He considered a moment. ^^-Tt was last autumn.” 

‘^Yes, in the autumn. Father’s hands were tied then. 
Now the case is quite different.” And Ethel fired off her 
broadside. Papa told me that I might take the work over. 
But he naturally feels he cannot make the advances. You, 
he says, must go to him.” She said it quite simply. 

Allan sat still. The blood rushed to his head. He suddenly 
seemed to hear the thunderous labor of the works again. 
Could it he true? Lloyd? His excitement was so great 
that he got up. He was silent awhile. Then he looked at 
Ethel. She was buttoning her gloves, and this little act 
seemed to need her entire attention. 

Ethel rose and smiled at Allan. Of course papa didn’t 
tell me to say this. He must never know even that I have 
been here.” She held out her hand. 

Allan looked at her with a thankful glance. ‘^It was 
really very friendly of you to come and see me. Miss Lloyd ! ” 
he said, and took her hand. 

She laughed again. Oh, please don’t say that. I have 
nothing doing just now, and I thought I’d just come and 
see what you were doing. Good-by.” 


II 

PLANS AGLEY 


That evening Ethel was so bright that it did old Lloyd^s 
heart good to see her. And after dinner she slipped her arms 
round his neck and said : Has my dear old father time 

to-morrow morning to talk something very important over 
with me?^^ 

To-day, if you like, Ethel.’^ 

No, to-morrow. And will he do all I want him to do? 

If he can, my child.^^ 

^^He canl^^ 

The next day Allan received a very friendly invitation in 
Lloyd’s own handwriting, which clearly betrayed Ethel’s 
dictation. 

Allan found Lloyd in excellent spirits. He was more 
shriveled, and Allan had the impression that the old man 
was growing rather childish. For example, he had completely 
forgotten Allan’s visit of the past autumn. He gossiped 
about all the innovations which had come about in the course 
of the past months, about scandals and elections. Although 
his brain seemed to be giving way, he was still lively and full 
of interest in everything, observant and quick as ever. Allan 
chatted absent-mindedly, for he was full of his own thoughts. 
He could find no means of bringing the conversation round to 
the Tunnel. 

Lloyd told him of plans he had made for observatories 
which he intended to present to various nations, and as Allan 
was on the point of veering round to the topic which was 
his only interest, the man-servant announced that Miss Lloyd 
was waiting for the gentlemen. 

Ethel was dressed as if for a ball. She looked dazzling. 

289 


290 


THE TUNNEL 


Everything about her was bright and fresh and elegant. 
Without the disfiguring, ugly mark on her chin, she would 
have been the most celebrated beauty in New York. Allan 
was surprised when he saw her. He had never realized before 
how lovely she was. But what surprised him still more was 
her talent for acting when she greeted him. 

Why, is that you, Mr. Allan ? she exclaimed, and looked 
at him with shining, straight blue eyes. ‘^How long is it 
since we met? Where have you hidden yourseK all this 
time ? 

Ethel, don’t be so curious ! ” her father remonstrated. 

Ethel laughed. At dinner she was in the best of spirits. 

They sat down at a big round mahogany table, which 
Ethel herself had profusely decorated with flowers. Lloyd’s 
head looked almost grotesque in such surroundings — a brown 
mummy in a sea of blooms. Ethel was constantly looking 
after her father. He was only allowed to eat certain things, 
and laughed like a child when she refused him everything 
that he enjoyed, and which the doctor had forbidden him. 

Pleasure showed itself in every line of his face when Ethel 
put some lobster mayonnaise before him. 

To-day we won’t be so strict, dad,” she said, “ because 
Mr. Allan is here.” 

^^Mind you come often, then, Allan,” gurgled Lloyd. 

She’s kinder to me when you’re here.” 

At every opportunity that presented itself Ethel let Allan 
understand how pleased she was to see him. 

After dinner they took coffee in a lofty hall, which resembled 
a palm-house. It was so dark that only their profiles could 
be seen. Lloyd had to be careful of his inflamed eyes. 
^^Sing us something, child,” said Lloyd, and lighted a big 
black cigar. They were specially prepared for him in Havana, 
and were the only luxury which he permitted himself. 

Ethel shook her head. ‘^No, dad; Mr. Allan doesn’t like 
music.” 

The brown mummy-skull turned to Allan. ^^You don’t 
like music?” 

I have no ear,” Allan answered. 


PLANS AGLEY 


291 


Lloyd nodded. ^‘How could you?’^ he began with the 
thoughtful importance of an old man. You have to think, 
and you don’t need music. It was just the same with me 
years ago. Then as I grew older and the necessity to dream 
came over me, suddenly I loved it. Music is only for women, 

children and weak-minded folk 

Shame, father ! ” called Ethel out of the depths of a 
rocker. 

I enjoy the privilege of old age, Allan,” he continued idly. 

Besides, Ethel has brought me up on music — ^my little 
Ethel, who sits there mocking at her father I ” 

Isn’t papa a dear ? ” said Ethel, and looked at Allan. 

Then, after a little heated discussion between father and 
daughter, in which Lloyd was badly beaten, Lloyd began 
of his own accord to speak of the Tunnel. ^^How is the 
Tunnel getting on, Allan ? ” 

In all his questions it was easy to see that he had been 
carefully primed by his daughter and that Lloyd was trying 
to draw him on kindly. 

The Germans are anxious to have a regular airship 
service,” said Lloyd. ‘^You’ll see that it will easily go for- 
ward now, Allan.” 

The moment had come. And Allan said clearly and loudly, 
^^Give me your name, Mr. Lloyd, and I will begin to-mor- 
row.” 

Whereupon Lloyd answered thoughtfully, ^‘1 have wanted 
to make proposals to you for some time, Allan. I have even 
thought of writing to you whilst you have been away. But 
Ethel said: Wait till Allan comes to you. She wouldn’t 
allow it ! ” 

Lloyd chuckled triumphantly at the trick he was playing 
on Ethel. 

Suddenly there appeared on his face a look of surprise as 
Ethel, striking the palm of her hand on the arm of the chair, 
got up, pale to the lips, and said, with eyes blazing, Father, 
how dare you say such a thing ? ” 

She threw the train of her dress over her arm, and banged 
the door. 


292 


THE TUNNEL 


Allan sat dumbfounded. Lloyd had given her away I 
Lloyd turned his head excitedly. 

^‘Now, what have I done?^^ he stammered. was only 
a joke! I didn’t mean it. What have I said wrong?” he 
asked, perplexed by Ethel’s sudden exit. 

He pulled himself together, and tried to seem bright and 
confident. “ Oh, she’ll come back,” he said quietly. She 
has the best heart in the world, Allan ! But she is not to be 
counted on; she is very moody, just as her mother was. 
And then she comes back after a time, kneels near me, and 
strokes me and says : ^ I’m sorry, papa ; to-day’s one of my 
bad days ! ’ ” 

Ethel’s chair was still rocking. There was silence. Some- 
where in the great hall an invisible fountain babbled and 
splashed. 

In the street motors were tooting like ships in a fog. 

Lloyd looked at Allan, who sat silently there; then he 
glanced at the door and listened. After a pause he rang for 
the man-servant. 

Where is Miss Lloyd ? ” he asked. 

Miss Lloyd has gone to her room.” 

Lloyd’s head fell. Then we shan’t see her again, Allan,” 
he said in a quiet and disappointed tone. ^‘1 shall not see 
her to-morrow either. And a day without Ethel is to me a 
lost day. I have nothing but Ethel.” He shook his little 
bald head and could not be reassured. Promise me you will 
come back to-morrow, so that we may calm Ethel down. 
Who can understand such a girl? If only I knew I’ve done 
wrong ? ” 

Lloyd spoke sadly. He was deeply grieved. Then he was 
silent, staring straight in front of him. He gave the im- 
pression of an unhappy, desperate man. 

After a time Allan got up and asked Lloyd to excuse him. 

^^I’ve robbed you of your good humor too, through my 
stupidity,” said Lloyd, nodding as he gave Allan his little 
hand, which was as soft as a girl’s. She was so pleased 
that you were coming! She was in such high spirits! The 
whole day she’s called me dad.” And Lloyd remained sitting 


PLANS AGLEY 


293 


alone in the half-lighted palm-hall, very small in the big 
room, staring in front of him — an old, desolate man. 

In the meantime Ethel, full of shame and anger, sat in her 
room tearing np half a dozen handkerchiefs and hurling 
inconsistent reproaches at her father. 

How could father say it ? . . . How could he ? . . . What 
must Mac think of me now ? 

Allan wrapt himself up in his coat and left the house. 
Lloyd’s car was waiting for him, but he dismissed it. He 
went slowly down the avenue. It was snowing. Soft flakes 
were falling, and his feet passed silently over the white 
carpet. 

Allan had a bitter drawn smile on his lips. He under- 
stood! His character was open and straightforward, and 
he seldom thought of the motives of others. He had no 
passions, nor did he understand passion in his fellow creatures. 
He was without guile, and never imagined intrigue and craft 
in others. 

He had not thought it very strange that Ethel should look 
him up in the Tunnel town. In the old days she had often 
been to his house, and was a real friend of his. 

He had considered it an act of friendliness — ^her coming and 
telling him that Lloyd would help. Now he saw through her ! 
He was to be beholden to her alone! He was to gain the 
impression that she, Ethel, had talked her father into great 
financial enterprises ! In a word, it was to depend on Ethel 
Lloyd whether he could go on building or not. But, by God, 
Ethel did not know him ! 

Allan’s step became slower and slower. His last hope had 
been Lloyd. But under these conditions it was out of the 
question ! His last hope was gone . . . 

The next morning he received a telegram from Lloyd, in 
which the old man begged him to come to supper. I will 
ask Ethel to sup with us, and I am sure she will not refuse. 
I have not seen her to-day.” Allan wired hack that he could 
not possibly come that night as a mass of water had burst 
into the north gallery. That was true, but his presence was 
in no wise necessary. 


294 


THE TUNNEL 


Day after day he was in the dreary galleries, and his heart 
took to it the gloom of his surroundings. The inaction that 
was forced upon him ate into his very being. 

About a week later, one clear winter^s day, Ethel came to 
Mac City. She arrived at Allan^s office just as he was having 
a conference with Strom. She was entirely wrapped in white 
fur, and looked fresh and bright. 

Hullo ! she began, without beating about the bush and 
just as if nothing had happened. How lucky to find you in ! 
Eather sent me to fetch you.^’ She completely ignored Strom. 

Mr. Strom ! ” said Allan, taken in by EtheFs composure 
and sang froid, 

‘‘ I have had the pleasure ! murmured Strom, as he bowed 
and left. 

Ethel took not the slightest notice. 

^^Yes,” she went on, ‘‘1 have come to call for you, Mr. 
Allan. This evening there is a concert at the Philharmonic, 
and father wants you to come to it with us. My car is down 
below.’^ 

Allan looked quietly into her eyes. 

I must get on with my work. Miss Lloyd,” he said. 

Ethel looked at him piercingly and pouted. 

" Good heavens, are you still angry with me because of 
the other day ? I know I was wrong,” she said, but listen 
' — was it nice of papa to say that? Just as if I were in- 
triguing against you? Now, father said I must bring you 
with me to-day. If you still have something to do, I can 
wait. The weather is beautiful, and I shall go for a drive in 
the meantime. May I count on you? I’ll ’phone to papa 
immediately . . .” 

Allan wanted to refuse. But as he looked at Ethel, he 
knew that refusal would wound her pride deeply, and then 
his hopes would be forever buried. Yet he could not make 
up his mind to accept, but answered vaguely: ‘^Perhaps, 
but I can’t say yet.” 

By six o’clock you can surely make up your mind ? ” said 
Ethel in a friendly, modest tone. 


PLANS AGLEY 


295 


I may be able to. But I fear that it is not possible for 
me to come.” 

" Good-by,” she called out gayly. I’ll come at six, and 
hope that I may have luck.” 

Punctually at six Ethel was at the door. 

Allan excused himself with regrets, and Ethel drove off. 


Ill 


BURNT BRIDGES 

Allan had burnt his bridges behind him. 

In spite of the hopelessness of the situation, he determined 
to make a final attempt. He turned once again to the Gov- 
ernment, but without result. He stayed three weeks in Wash- 
ington, and was the guest of the President, who gave a 
dinner in his honor, and they paid him just the respect and 
honor due to a dethroned monarch. But the Government 
could take no part for the moment in the building of the 
Tunnel. 

Thereupon Allan tried for a last time with the banks and 
financiers, without tangible result. Some bankers and capital- 
ists led him, however, to understand that they might even- 
tually take a part in it if Lloyd would lead the way. So 
Allan came back to Lloyd. 

Lloyd received him in a very friendly manner. He asked 
him into his quiet study. He talked Wall Street and markets 
with him, and described in minutest detail the present state 
of the petroleum, steel, sugar, and cotton markets. An 
extraordinary fall after an extraordinary rise. The world 
was quite ten years behind in economic development, try as 
she would to go with the times. 

As soon as Allan was able to interrupt Lloyd, he went 
straight for what he wanted. He described the attitude of 
the Government, and Lloyd listened with bent head. 

That’s all true ! They haven’t been fooling you, Allan. 
You must make up your mind to wait three to five years.” 

Allan twitched. I can’t ! ” he cried out. Three to 
five years ! I had put all my hopes in you, Mr. Lloyd ! ” 

Lloyd wagged his head thoughtfully to and fro. It can’t 
be done ! ” he said decisively, and pressed his lips together. 

296 


EXTENT BEIDGES 


297 

They were silent. It was all over. 

But, as Allan was taking leave, Lloyd asked him to stay to 
dinner. Allan was undecided, but it was scarcely possible 
for him to leave yet. Though it was ridiculous, he still 
had a little hope. 

Ethel will be speechless with surprise ! She has no idea 
that you are here.” Ethel — Ethel. — Now that Lloyd had 
once mentioned the name of his idol he could talk of nothing 
else. He poured his heart out to Allan. Fancy,” he said, 

Ethel was away in the yacht a whole fortnight during 
that very bad weather. I had bribed the telegraphist — oh, 
yes, bribed, for one must do such things where Ethel is con- 
cerned — ^but he didn’t telegraph. Ethel had seen through 
me. She is in a bad temper, and we have quarreled again. 
Yet each day that I don’t see her is a misery to me. I sit 
and wait for her. I’m an old man, Allan, and have nothing 
but my daughter.” 

Ethel was amazed when she saw Allan come in. She 
frowned, then went quickly forward to meet him and held 
out her hand to him, while a slight flush crept over her cheeks. 

‘^You, here, Mr. Allan! How splendid! I must confess 
that I haven’t had much good to say of you for some weeks 
past!” 

Lloyd chuckled. He said to himself that Ethel would be 
in a better temper now. 

was prevented from coming to the concert,” Allan 
replied. 

^^I thought you never told untruths, Mr. Allan! Listen 
to him telling untruths, papa. He was prevented! What 
prevented him? You just didn’t want to. Say it out 
straight.” 

Well, I didn’t want to.” 

Lloyd looked frightened. He was prepared now for a 
storm. Ethel was capable of breaking a plate and rushing 
out of the room. He was astonished when she merely laughed. 

You see ? He has to be truthful ! ” 

She was light-hearted and good-humored all that evening. 

^^But you mind what I tell you, my friend,” she said. 


398 


THE TUNNEL 


when he was leaving. ^^Yon mustn’t behave so abominably; 
a second time, or I shall not forgive yon.” 

‘^I’ll be careful,” answered Allan, jestingly. 

Ethel studied his face. She did not like his tone of voice. 
But she did not betray her feelings, and merely rejoined, 
‘^Well, we shall see!” 

Some evenings later Allan was to be seen with Ethel in 
Lloyd’s box in the Madison Square Palace. 

They arrived after the concert had begun, and their en- 
trance evoked so much attention and comment that the 
Egmont overture was almost completely lost. 

Ethel’s costume was worth a fortune. It was a creation 
which had taxed the resources of the three greatest fashion 
artists in New York. The dress was a tissue of silver em- 
broidery and ermine, and it showed off her neck and shoulders 
to perfection. 

They were alone, for at the last moment Ethel had per- 
suaded her father to remain at home on the plea that she 
thought he was not looking well. She had done so with so 
many endearing expressions that the old man had settled down 
in his arm-chair, quite content to wait patiently for her 
return. 

Ethel was anxious to be seen alone with Allan, and she 
saw to it that the box was brilliantly lit. During the interval 
all glasses were turned in their direction, and they could hear 
their names spoken on every side. 

Allan’s prestige came back in a flash now that he was 
to be seen sitting by the side of the millionaire’s daughter. 
Embarrassed, he drew back as far as possible. 

Ethel, however, turned towards him with a meaning smile, 
and then bent forward out of the box, displaying all her 
beautiful teeth as she laughed gayly, thoroughly enjoying her 
triumph. 

Allan was a prey to mingled emotions. His memory went 
back to that evening when he and Maud had occupied the box 
opposite, and he had sat waiting for Lloyd to send for him. 
He remembered distinctly little details of Maud’s appearance 
that night — her almost transparent rosy ear, the slightly 


BUENT BRIDGES 


299 


hectic flush on her cheeks, the dreamy look in her eyes. He 
remembered, too, the very tone of voice in which Ethel had 
said, How do you do, Mr. Allan ? when he was in Lloyd’s 
box. He asked himself now: Do you wish that Lloyd had 
never come that evening, and that the Tunnel had never 
been begun? And he shuddered at himself as he reflected 
that his answer was — No. 

On the following day shares in the Tunnel began to move 
slightly, and one newspaper declared boldly that Ethel Lloyd 
and Allan were about to become engaged. 

Another paper published a contradiction from Ethel Lloyd 
at once. She declared that the man who had made the 
statement was an absolute liar; ^^Mr. Allan and I are good 
friends, however,” she added, ‘^and I am proud of the 
fact.” 

Quite unceremoniously she turned up every afternoon in 
her cream-colored motor at the Tunnel offices in Hoboken 
which Allan now made his headquarters and took him for an 
hour’s drive. Allan made no resistance. Often, during their 
drive together, they did not exchange a word. 

The rumor of their engagement was repeated continually 
in the papers, with the result that Tunnel shares continued to 
look up. Industry and commerce generally were on the 
mend, and it was indubitable that the regular appearance of 
Ethel Lloyd’s motor at Hoboken station at 6 p. m. had its 
effect upon the money-market. 

Allan began to be sensitive on the subject. He made up 
his mind to act. One day, in the course of their drive, he 
proposed to Ethel. She laughed merrily as she looked at 
him with wide-open eyes. Don’t talk such nonsense,” was 
all she said. 

Allan, suddenly looking very white, stood up in the car and 
called out to the chauffeur to stop. 

‘^What are you doing,” Ethel exclaimed, reddening, much 
astonished. We are thirty miles from New York.” 

^‘That doesn’t matter,” he said, and got out without an- 
other word. 

He walked on through woods and over fields for two hours, 


30Q 


THE TUNNEL 


quivering with chagrin and anger. He had done with this 
schemer. Never again would he speak to her or have any- 
thing to do with her. The devil take her ! 

At last he reached a railway station and took a train back 
to Hoboken. He arrived at midnight, ordered his motor, 
and drove at once to Mac City. 

He went back to the interior of the Tunnel. He would 
spend all his time there henceforth. 


IV 


THE TIDE TEENS 

Ethel Lloyd went for a trip on her yacht, and remained 
away eight days. She took Vanderstyfft as a guest, and led 
him such a life that he swore he would never cross her path 
again. 

On returning to New York, she made her way at once 
to Hoboken to get news of Allan. She was informed that he 
was in the Tunnel, working. She immediately sent a message 
to him, asking him to forgive her. His proposal had taken 
her by surprise, she told him, and she had been betrayed into 
replying foolishly. She asked him to come to dinner next 
evening. She was not waiting for any reply, so he could see 
for himself that she counted upon his coming. 

Allan was now in a difficult position. Ethel’s telegram 
reached him in the Tunnel, and he read it by the light of a 
dirt-begrimed safety-lamp. He saw a dozen such lamps 
gleaming in the dark gallery; nothing else was visible. He 
thought of the miles of galleries lying empty and idle, all the 
thousands of engines going to rust. He thought of all the 
disheartened engineers at lonely stations, eating their hearts 
out over their monotonous work. Many hundreds of them 
had already left him. And as he folded up the telegram he 
had a vision of what might be — trains thundering through 
the galleries, and making their way in triumph from the old 
world to the new . . . 

Ethel welcomed him with playful reproaches. Surely he 
must have known what a capricious, badly-brought-up person 
she was! Anyway, from that time on, her motor would be 
waiting for him as before every day at six o’clock at the 
Tunnel station. She felt she knew better now how to man- 

301 


302 


THE TUHNEE 


age him. She had been too outwardly attentive to him be- 
fore. 

Henceforward, she had only to mention that she wanted to 
see something at a certain theater, and Allan of his own 
accord engaged a box and sat out the performance patiently, 
even when bored to death. They went about everywhere to- 
gether. Allan, driving himself as of old, would take her 
down Fifth Avenue in his own car. He even consented at 
last to let her enter the Tunnel. 

She had studied all the printed accounts of the Tunnel, 
but her lack of knowledge of things mechanical had pre- 
vented her from being able to picture the reality in her mind. 
She had had no idea of what three hundred miles in an al- 
most dark tunnel actually meant. The noise as of thunder 
which accompanied the train, and which was so tremendous 
that they had to scream to make themselves heard, thrilled 
her delightfully. The building stations, the giant ventilators, 
evoked her amazement. She had not realized in the least 
what wonderful machinery was at work here day and night 
under the sea. 

A red light glowed out of the darkness like a beacon. The 
train stopped. They had reached the scene of the disaster. 
Ethel was struck dumb by the sight. It would have sig- 
nified little to her to he told that this chasm was eighty or 
a hundred yards in depth and more than a hundred in width, 
and that a thousand men were engaged day and night in 
it. 

But now she saw for herself that eighty or a hundred yards 
was a tremendous depth — equal to the height of a twenty- 
story building. And down at the bottom she could see 
minute objects moving about in the light of the arc-lamps. 
Was it possible they were really men? 

Suddenly a little cloud of dust rose, and a sound like that 
of a cannon reverberated throughout the gallery. 

What was that ? ” 

Blasting.’^ 

They got into the cage and went down. They slid down 
past the arc-lamps, and the workers seemed to come towards 


THE TIDE TUENS 


303 


them perpendicularly. When they reached the bottom Ethel 
could not restrain her astonishment as she realized the height 
from which they had come. The mouth of the Tunnel looked 
like a small black door. Immense shadows, shadows as of 
gigantic demons, moved about on the walls . . . 

Ethel emerged from the Tunnel almost dizzy with excite- 
ment, and could not stop talking about all she had seen. 
The locks of the Panama Canal were child’s play compared 
to the Tunnel, she declared to Allan. 

Next day the papers came out with long interviews in 
which she was made to describe all her impressions anew. 

On the following day, it was announced definitely that she 
and Allan were engaged. 

The marriage took place at the end of July. Ethel cele- 
brated the occasion by inaugurating a Pension Fund for 
the Tunnel workers with a sum of eight million dollars. The 
wedding ceremonies were carried out in princely style in the 
great banquet hall of the Atlantic, the hotel on the roof 
garden of which the famous meeting of financiers had taken 
place nine years earlier. 

New York had not seen so brilliant a gathering for many 
years as that which attended the wedding. Old Lloyd him- 
self, hermit that he was, absented himself. He had gone for 
a cruise on the Goldfish with his doctor. 

Ethel was radiant. She wore the ^^Rose” diamond and 
looked young and happy and sparkling. 

Allan also looked happy. He even laughed and joked; 
he was determined that no one should say there was any 
ground for the theory that he had sold himself to Ethel. 
But he was really in a state of feverish worry, though he 
disguised it well. He could not help thinking sadly and 
bitterly of Maud and all the past. At nine o’clock Ethel and 
he drove off to Lloyd’s house, where they were to stay for the 
first few weeks. They did not exchange a word en route, nor 
did Ethel want Allan to talk. He lay back in the car, look- 
ing very tired, and gazed out on the streets with half-closed, 
unseeing eyes. Once Ethel put out her hand to take his, but 
it felt cold and lifeless. 


304 


THE TUNNEL 


At Thirty-Second Street the car had to stop for a minute. 
Allan, looking up, caught sight of a placard bearing the 
words: ^^The Tunnel. A Hundked Thousand Men.^^ 

He opened his eyes for a moment, but the look of utter 
weariness in them came back at once. 

Ethel had had the palm room lit up for the occasion, and 
she asked Allan to stay with her in it for a while. 

She sat down just as she was in her wedding robes, the 
Eose diamond above her forehead, and smoked a cigarette, 
glancing covertly at Allan from time to time through her 
long eyelashes. 

Allan walked up and down restlessly just as though he 
were alone. 

It was very quiet in the room. There was a splashing 
from a hidden fountain, and now and again there could be 
heard the faint rustling of a plant. 

Are you very tired, Mac ? asked Ethel. 

Allan stood still and looked at her. Yes,” he replied, in 
an expressionless voice. “ What a crowd it was ! ” He was 
only ten paces away from her, but they seemed miles apart. 
Never was there a lonelier honeymoon couple ! 

Allan looked ill and gray. His eyes were dull and luster- 
less. He could no longer dissemble. 

She stood up and went near him. Mac,” she said softly. 

Allan looked at her. 

‘‘ Listen, Mac,” she began, in her gentlest voice, I must 
talk to you. Listen. I donT want you to be unhappy. On 
the contrary, I want with my whole heart to make you happy. 
Don’t imagine that I am so foolish as to imagine that you 
married me for love. I have no claims whatever upon your 
heart. You are just as free as ever, not tied to me in that 
way in the least. You needn’t try to make me think that 
you love me in the very slightest degree. I claim nothing 
from you, Mac — nothing. I should be ashamed to do so. 
Nothing except the right, which I have had for weeks past 
already, of being near you a little always.” 

She ceased speaking for a moment. Allan remained 
silent. 


THE TIDE TUENS 


305 


She went on: ‘^Now, there shall be no more play-acting, 
Mac. That is all over and done with. I had to do a little 
play-acting in order to get hold of you, but now that I have 
got you I need do no more. Now I can be my own self, and 
you will see that I am not merely the capricious, ill-tempered 
creature that has been such a terror to men. Are you listen- 
ing? I must have my say out so that you may understand 
me ... I liked you from the moment I saw you. Your 
scheme, your own ability and energy, aroused my enthusiasm. 
I am rich — I knew as a child that I was going to be rich. I 
said to myself that I ought to live a wonderful life. At 
sixteen I dreamt of marrying a prince. At seventeen I 
thought of giving my money away to the army. At eighteen 
I had no plans of any kind. I lived just like any other 
young girls who have rich parents. But I found it all dread- 
fully boring. I was not unhappy, but I was far from being 
happy. I just existed from day to day, filling time as best 
I could. As it seems to me now, I gave no time at all to 
thinking. Then Hobby turned up with your scheme. Out 
of pure curiosity I forced Dad to tell me about it, for he and 
Hobby were disposed to keep it a secret. I studied your plans 
with Hobby, and pretended I understood everything. For 
it really did interest me enormously. Hobby told me all 
about you and what a splendid fellow you were, and I be- 
came anxious to see you. Then at last I saw you. And I 
liked you. You looked so simple and strong and healthy. 
I had a feeling of respect for you such as I had never had 
for a man before. And I wished so much that you might 
be nice to me, but you were quite indifferent. How often 
have I thought of that evening! I knew that you were 
married — Hobby had told me that — and it never occurred 
to me that I could be more to you than a friend. Later I 
began to be jealous of Maud. Forgive me, Mac, for calling 
her by her name! . . . And I used to wish myself in her 
place and to say to myself that my money would be some 
good if I were. But, as that might not be, I tried to content 
myself with being your friend, and it was to try and be- 
come your friend that I went to you so often — and for no 


306 


THE TUNNEL 


other reason. If ever I indulged in day-dreams of how I 
could win your love and make you forsake your wife and 
child for me, that was only for a moment, and never really 
went further. But I did not succeed in getting any further 
with you as a friend, Mac. You had made up your mind 
that you had no time for me, and that I didn^t interest you. 
I am not sentimental, Mac, but I was very, very unhappy 
over it all . . . Then came the great disaster. Believe me, 
I would have given everything in the world for all that not 
to have happened. I swear it to you! Oh, it was terrible, 
and I suffered greatly. But I am an egoist, Mac, a dreadful 
egoist ; and even while I was grieving about Maud the thought 
would force itself upon me that now you were free. You 
were free I From that moment I began to make new efforts 
to get near you. Mac, I wanted you. The strike, the closing 
of the Tunnel, the bankruptcy, all your troubles worked in 
my favor. I kept urging father to back you, but his reply 
was always, ‘ Impossible ! ’ At last, that J anuary, I told 
him it must be possible — that he must make it possible. I 
kept on worrying him. At last he consented, and he offered 
to write to you and offer you his help. But I said to my- 
self, ‘ Mac will merely accept Papa’s help, come here to dine 
a couple of times, and that will be all.’ I saw that his name 
and money were my only weapons! I am very frank, Mac, 
am I not? Forgive me! I asked papa just this once in 
his life to do exactly as I wanted without asking any ques- 
tions. I threatened that I would leave him, and that he 
would never see me again, if he didn’t humor me. That 
was wicked of me, but I couldn’t help it. Of course I would 
not have left him really — I am much too fond and proud of 
him, but I had to frighten him. Well, Mac, you know the 
rest. I didn’t behave very nicely, but how else could I have 
managed things? I have suffered, but I was ready to go to 
extremes. When you proposed to me, I was tempted to ac- 
cept at once, but I wanted you to put yourself to a little 
trouble about me, Mac 

Ethel was speaking in quite low tones, sometimes almost 
in a whisper. She smiled at times, but sometimes her fore- 


THE TIDE TURNS 


307 


head puckered up in sad and anxious lines. Now she fixed 
her eyes on him very tenderly, and said ; 

Are you listening to me, Mac ? 

^^Yes,’^ Allan replied, gently. 

I had to tell you all this, Mac,” she went on. I had to 
be quite frank and open with you. Now you know all about 
it. Perhaps, in spite of everything, we shall be able to be 
good friends and pals?” 

She looked fondly at him again, smiling. Slowly he took 
her beautiful head in his hands. 

I hope so, Ethel,” he replied, and his lips quivered. 

Ethel nestled for a moment against his breast then she 
drew herself up, and continued: 

One more thing I must say to you. I wanted you, and 
now I have you. But, mind, I want you to trust me and to 
get to love me. It is for me to make you do so, and I shall 
try and try until I succeed. Eor I shall succeed, I am sure. 
If I were not, I should be miserable. And now good-night, 
dear!” 

She left the room, walking very slowly. Allan remained 
motionless. 


V 


FULL SPEED AHEAD! 

The Tunnel! 

A Hundred Thousand Men! 

They came. Farmhands, miners, artisans, tramps! The 
Tunnel drew them like some monstrous magnet. They came 
from Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, 
Canada, Mexico. Special trains rushed across the States. 
From North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, came 
thousands of negroes. Thousands of workers came back once 
more who had fled in panic at the time of the catastrophe. 

From Germany, England, Belgium, France, Kussia, Italy, 
Spain, came thousands more. 

The dead Tunnel cities came to life again. The white 
moons of the arc-lamps were to be seen shining again in the 
huge green dusty halls of glass; the cranes were again in 
motion; white clouds of steam, black clouds of smoke, blew 
again hither and thither. Men scrambled again upon the 
steel frameworks of new buildings. There was a hum and 
buzz of life and energy. 

The idle steamers in the ports of New York, Savannah, 
New Orleans and San Francisco, of London, Liverpool, 
Glasgow, Hamburg, Rotterdam, Oporto and Bordeaux, began 
once again to show signs of life. Deserted smelting furnaces 
began to work noisily. Rusty engines were put into use 
again. The world’s money markets became brisk. Tunnel 
shares went up. The spirit of enterprise awoke. 

Lloyd Takes on the Tunnel I ” 

That was the cry. Lloyd was taking on the Tunnel, all 
by himself! 


308 


FULL SPEED AHEAD ! 


309 


The Tunnel was going full speed ahead ! 

Five years after re-starting the work, the galleries between 
America and Bermuda had drawn so close to each other that 
Allan could communicate by telephone with Strom, who was 
in control of the Bermuda side. The whole world was now 
on tiptoe to learn of the meeting of the two sections. The 
immense masses of stone, the great heat, the enormous weight 
of iron would be bound to have their effect upon the instru- 
ments, and there were people in the scientific world who 
doubted whether the meeting would be effected. But the 
seismographs began to record blasting operations at a distance 
of nine miles, and in the fifteenth year from the beginning 
of the enterprise the two sections met. There was a diver- 
gence of a hundred feet in depth and of sixty feet sideways 
but this was made good without much difficulty. Two years 
later the double galleries between America and Bermuda were 
completed. 

This was a big step in advance. Cement and rails as well 
as workmen could now be conveyed to Bermuda by train. 

The French section of the Tunnel was much more difficult. 
Allan made a single gallery at first. In the fourteenth year 
a great eruption took place, and two miles of the gallery with 
expensive machinery had to be abandoned. An iron wall 
a hundred and twenty feet thick had to be constructed as 
a defense against the pressure of mud and water. Two 
hundred and seventy workmen lost their lives. The gallery 
was, however, continued in a curve which avoided the dan- 
gerous spot in the ocean bed where the accident had occurred. 
As a result of this misfortune, three miles of the Tunnel cost 
sixty million dollars to construct. This section of the Tunnel 
was completed in the twenty-first year. 

With the completion of these two sections, the total ex- 
penditure became greatly lessened. Entire battalions of work- 
men were got rid of month by month. The Tunnel continued, 
however, to swallow millions. Ethel had thrown her immense 
fortune into it. Had it not been completed, she would have 
become a pauper. Lloyd himself was so heavily involved 
that he had to put forth all his energy to keep afloat. 


310 


THE TUNNEL 


The mid-Atlantic section of the Tunnel, also built as a 
single gallery at first, involved more difficulties than either of 
the others. Here the workmen’s greatest enemy was the 
appalling heat. The gallery was at a depth of seven thousand 
yards beneath the level of the sea. The heat was so tremen- 
dous that wood could no longer be used in the construction 
and only iron could be employed. 

The atmosphere in the long galleries was terribly oppressive. 
At distances of seven miles stations had to be erected in 
which refrigerators, ozone apparatus and air-pumps were 
worked day and night. 

From both sides the borers ate their way in deeper and 
deeper : fat Muller ” in control of the one working from the 
Azores, Strom in control of that from Bermuda. Strom 
did wonders. He was not beloved by his workers, but they 
admired him. He was a man who could go on for days 
without food, drink, or rest. He was to be seen almost 
daily in the galleries, superintending the work at critical 
points. For days together sometimes he would not leave the 
galleries at all. His workmen called him the ^^Kussian 
Devil.” 

Daily the galleries were giving forth 4,000 car loads of 
stone to the Azores, and 3,000 to Bermuda. Enormous build- 
ing grounds were created. Bocks, sand banks, islands, were 
united together for this purpose — ^new land reclaimed by 
Allan from the ocean. His engineers produced for him 
break-waters, piers, docks, and light-houses, all of the most 
modern description. The biggest steamers could unload their 
cargo. His architects conjured forth new towns out of the 
material supplied from the Tunnel. There were hotels, 
banks, churches, schools — all newly built. All Allan’s towns 
had one thing in common : they were entirely without vegeta- 
tion. Made of gneiss and granite, they shone like glass in 
the sun. When the wind blew they seemed to turn into 
clouds of dust. 

In ten years’ time they would have as much verdure to 
show as other towns, for space was left for parks, gardens 
and squares just as in London, Paris, and Berlin. Great 


PULL SPUED AHEAD! 


311 


shiploads of earth kept arriving. The ocean supplied sea- 
weed, saltpeter came from Chili. Trees and plants also were 
imported in great quantities. Here and there already might 
be seen the skeleton outlines of what would become parks, 
with dusty palms and trees and meager plots of grass. 

There was one special feature about Allan’s towns. They 
had the straightest streets in the world and the finest espla- 
nades. They also bore a strong family resemblance. They 
were all bits of America, outposts of the American genius, 
symbols of energy and will-power. 

Mac City had a population of a million by the time the 
Tunnel approached completion. 

Mishaps and accidents continued to occur in the Tunnel, 
but they were not more frequent or important than with other 
great enterprises. Allan had grown nervous and anxious. 
His nerves were not as strong as they had been. At first 
he had not been shaken even when a hundred men were 
lost, but now the death of a single individual excited him. 
The galleries were full of apparatus devised for purposes 
of giving signals of danger and at the slightest warning he 
would give orders to ^^go slow.” 

Allan had grown gray. Gray old Mac ” he was called 
now. His health was undermined. He scarcely slept at all 
and was always on the alert for possible accidents. He was 
lonely, and his only relaxation was an hour’s walk by himself 
in the park. What happened in the outside world had not 
much interest for him. The Tunnel made him its slave. 
His brain knew no other association of ideas than engines, 
motors, stations, apparatus, numbers of cubic feet and horse 
power. Almost all human feelings in him had been atrophied. 
He had only one friend still and that was Lloyd. They often 
spent their evenings together. They sat in their arm-chairs 
and smoked in silence. 

In the eighteenth year of the building of the Tunnel, a 
great strike broke out and lasted two months. It was owing 
to Strom’s coolness that a second panic was averted. One 
day the temperature in the galleries rose five degrees. The 
phenomenon was inexplicable and pointed to the need for 


312 


THE TUNNEL 


great caution. The workmen refused to go in. They were 
afraid of a chasm opening suddenly and of a stream of glow- 
ing lava bursting out upon them. There were some who 
believed that the galleries were getting into contact with the 
fiery centers of the earth ; others that they were coming upon 
the crater of a submarine volcano. All work was laid aside 
and minute inspection was made of the part of the Tunnel 
affected. 

Strom and some picked men remained in the galleries day 
and night for four weeks. The Kussian Devil did not 
give it up until he had fainted from fatigue. Eight days 
later he was back again in the Hell section. The men 
worked here quite naked, looking like great oily dirty lizards 
as they moved about. 

In the twenty-fourth year of the great enterprise, when 
it was calculated that the two ends of the Tunnel were only 
thirty-six miles apart, Strom contrived to establish under- 
ground communication with Muller. After six months more 
of hard work it was felt that the distance between the two 
sections must he very slight, yet the seismographs used by 
Strom gave no indication of the blasting which went on day 
after day in Muller’s gallery. A rumor found its way into 
the newspapers that the two ends had failed to meet. 

Allan had passages bored in every direction, upwards, 
downwards, sidewards — a regular network of galleries as in 
a mine. The uncertainty was disheartening and alarming. 
The heat at this stage was more terrible than ever. Some 
of the workmen went raving mad. 

Four months were spent, fruitlessly as it seemed, in this 
difficult and anxious groping. The whole world was kept in 
suspense. Tunnel shares began again to sink. 

At last one night down in the gallery Allan heard a shout 
from Strom who came running towards him, his face scarcely 
recognizable from sweat and dirt. It was the first time Strom 
had ever been seen excited — he was even smiling. 

^^We have got on Muller’s track,” was all he said. 

Two dark faces now remained close together eagerly study- 
ing a seismograph in the light of a safety lamp. At one 


PULL SPEED AHEAD! 


313 


minute past two, it registered the faintest possible move- 
ment. At three minutes past three the needle moved again. 
Muller’s blastings — ^there could be no doubt about it. 

The newspapers of the whole world soon got hold of it. 
Muller had been run to earth. Had he been the greatest 
living criminal captured by detectives the sensation could 
not have been greater. 

From this point onwards, all went well. A fortnight later 
it was found that Muller’s gallery had reached a point almost 
immediately underneath. In three months’ time, the blast- 
ing could even be heard, like distant thunder. In one month 
more the sound of the boring machines could be made out. 
And then at last the moment came when a boring machine 
pierced the last remaining rock between the two sections. 

There were shouts of exultation, Where is Mac ? ” Muller 
shouted through. 

Here I am ! ” cried Allan. 

'^How are you?” said Muller. 

‘^All right,” replied Allan. 

They had been working for twenty-four years. It was the 
greatest moment of their lives. And this was all they could 
find to say. 

An hour later Muller was able to pass Allan a bottle of 
Munich beer, refreshingly cold. Next day it was possible to 
crawl through from one gallery into the other — 18,000 feet 
below the level of the sea. 

Allan’s journey back through the Tunnel was one long 
triumph. As he passed there were shouts of excitement and 
enthusiasm. ‘^Hats off to Mac! Mac is our man!” 


VI 


THE LIGHT FEOM BEYOND 

Ethel was very different from Maud. She did not allow 
herself to be kept at arm’s length, she made her way to the 
center of things. She went through a regular engineering 
course so as to be able to hold her own in discussions. She 
was determined to maintain her rights. 

She left Allan free at lunch-time, but that seemed to her 
as far as she need go. She always put in an appearance 
punctually at five o’clock whether Allan was in New York 
or in Mac City, and made tea for him quickly and without 
fuss. If he were engaged in conference with some architect 
or engineer, it did not trouble her. She continued to busy 
herself with the tea until it was ready, and then she in- 
terposed. And Allan had to take tea with her — ^whether 
alone or with others didn’t matter to her. 

At nine o’clock she waited patiently for him in her motor. 
His Sundays he had to spend with her always. He could 
invite friends or a whole crowd of engineers if he felt so 
inclined. She kept open house. People came and went as 
they chose. There were fifteen motor-cars always available 
for guests. Often Hobby would be of the party, coming 
there from his farm. Hobby produced some twenty thousand 
chickens every year and Heaven knows how many eggs. The 
world had no longer any interest for him. He had become 
religious and sometimes he would look seriously at Allan and 
say, Think of your soul, Mac ! ” 

When Allan traveled, Ethel traveled with him. She went 
with him several times to Bermuda, the Azores and Europe. 

Old Lloyd had bought a piece of land at Kawley, seven 
miles north of Mac City, where he had a big house built for 

314 


THE LIGHT EEOM BEYOND 


315 


Ethel. Lloyd came to visit her here every day, and he would 
sometimes stay for some weeks. 

When Allan and Ethel had been married for three years a 
son was born to them. This child was watched over by Ethel 
with the utmost devotion. He was Mac’s child — Mac whom 
she loved so. And in twenty years’ time he was to take up 
his father’s work and carry it on still further. 


CONCLUSIOlSr 


The borers crushed the stone in the galleries and the two 
ends of the Tunnel grew nearer daily. The last twenty miles 
were a problem. Allan was forced to pay ten dollars for two 
hours’ work as it was difficult to find any one who would go 
into the crater.” Sections from these galleries had to be 
overspun with nets of refrigerating pipes. After a year of 
hard labor they also were mastered. 

The Tunnel was finished. Man had undertaken this 
gigantic work and man had brought it to completion! It 
was built of blood and sweat, it had devoured nine thousand 
men and brought no end of misery to the world, but now it 
was done. And nobody wondered at it. 

Four weeks later the submarine pneumatic express post 
started to work. 

A publisher offered Allan a hundred thousand dollars if he 
would write the history of the Tunnel. Allan refused. He 
only wrote two columns for the Herald, 

Allan did not pretend to be more modest than he actually 
was. But he maintained over and over again that he had 
only been able to finish the work with the help of such men 
as Strom, Muller, Olin Muhlenberg, Hobby, Harriman, 
Barmann, and hundreds of others. 

However I must confess,” he wrote, that time has over- 
taken me. All my engines have become out of date, and I 
have found myself forced to replace them. The borers of 
which I was once very proud are now old-fashioned. The 
Kocky Mountains have been bored through in shorter time 
than I could have done it. The motor boats go from England 
to Hew York in two-and-a-half days, the German giant air- 
ships fly over the Atlantic in thirty-six hours. Still, I am 
faster than they are, and the faster they go the faster I shall 


CONCLUSION 


317 


be I I can easily raise tbe speed to three hundred miles an 
hour. Besides, airships and motor boats demand prices which 
only rich people can afford to pay. My prices are popular. 
The Tunnel belongs to the people, the tradesman, the emi- 
grant. 

‘^1 can take seventy thousand people daily. In ten years 
— when all the galleries will be twice as big — ^I shall be 
able to take eighty to a hundred thousand. In a hundred 
years the communication will be too great for the Tunnel. 
The Syndicate will have to construct parallel galleries which 
will be comparatively cheap and easy to build 

In his simply and awkwardly written article, Allan pro- 
claimed that in exactly six months’ time, on the first of June 
of the twenty-sixth year of the building of the Tunnel, he 
would send off the first train to Europe. 

In order to keep to this promise he hurried engineers and 
workmen on to a furious finish. For months trains full of 
old sleepers and rails came tearing into daylight. The rails 
for the Tunnel trains were put in order, trial journeys were 
made in all the galleries. An army of engine drivers was 
examined; for this Allan chose people who were particularly 
used to great speed: motor-men, motor-cyclists and aeroplane 
pilots. 

In the stations of Biscay and Mac City gigantic halls had 
grown up : manufactories for the Tunnel railroad cars. These 
cars made quite a sensation. They were somewhat lighter 
than Pullman cars, almost twice as long and quite twice as 
broad : ironclads which ran on a keel of four double pairs of 
heavy wheels and carried quite an organism of turbines, 
refrigerators, reservoirs, cables and pipes. The dining-cars 
were gorgeous. (There were to be musical entertainments 
and moving-picture performances during the journey.) 

The whole of New York stormed Hoboken in order to 
travel by the new cars at least to Mac City. For weeks past 
every place had been reserved in the Tunnel trains for the 
first three months. 

At last the first of June arrived ... New York was hung 
with fiags. So were London, Paris, Borne, Vienna, Berlin, 


318 


THE TUNNEL 


Pekin, Tokio, Sydney. The whole civilized world celebrated 
Allan’s first journey as a public festival. 

Allan intended to start the journey at midnight and arrive 
in Biscay at midnight (American time), the second of June. 

For days beforehand special trains had been running to 
Biscay from Berlin, London and Paris and to Mac City from 
all the big towns and states of America. Whole fieets of 
steamers sailed for Bermuda and the Azores. On the first of 
June trains crammed with people ran every hour to Mac 
City, for everybody wanted to see when the first America — 
Europe Flyer stormed into the Tunnel. The big hotels of 
New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Paris, Berlin and London 
arranged grand entertainments to begin at ten o’clock and 
last for forty-eight hours. The Edison-Biograph would pro- 
duce its gigantic Tunnel film lasting for six hours. In the 
variety shows and concert halls choirs of tunnelmen ap- 
peared and sang the Tunnel songs. Millions of postcards 
with Allan’s portrait were sold in the streets, and millions 
of Tunnel-charms,” consisting of small bits of stones from 
the galleries set in metal. 

Allan started precisely at twelve o’clock at night. The 
huge hall of Hoboken Station, the biggest in the world, was 
filled to its last square foot with an excited crowd of people, 
all stretching their necks to get a glimpse of the immense 
Tunnel train, ready to depart. It was gray in hue, entirely 
made of steel. 

The train, consisting of six carriages with the engine, was 
brightly lit up, and the lucky ones who stood near enough 
looked into gorgeous compartments. They were all saloon 
cars. It was taken for granted that Ethel would come for 
this first journey as, in spite of fantastically high prices, many 
would-be passengers had to be disappointed. At a quarter to 
twelve the iron shutters were drawn down. The excitement 
of the crowd grew every minute. At ten minutes to twelve, 
four engineers mounted the engine car, which looked like a 
torpedo boat with its two round eyes in the bow. At any 
moment now Allan might arrive. 

He came at five minutes to twelve. As he stepped on to 


CONCLUSION 


3191 

the platform a tremendous shout went through the hall. 

Allan had started this work as a young man and now he 
was standing there looking a worn out man, his hair snow- 
white, and his cheeks pallid and sunken, but his gray-blue 
eyes were still as good-natured and child-like as ever. Ethel, 
holding little Mac by the hand come out with him. Behind 
Ethel came a small bent man, the collar of his coat turned 
up and a broad traveling cap deep down over his face. He 
was hardly bigger than the little boy and was generally sup- 
posed to be a colored groom. It was Lloyd. 

The tiny mummy gave his hand to Ethel and the boy 
and climbed cautiously into the car. Not an emperor nor a 
king, not even the President of the Kepublic, but the great 
Money-Power Lloyd, was to be the first passenger! 

Ethel remained with her boy. She had brought little Mac 
from Pawley to witness this great event. Allan said good- 
by to both of them. 

The turbines began to move. The supporting beams 
loosened automatically when the turbines had turned a certain 
number of times — and the train moved out of the hall amidst 
the enthusiastic shouts of the crowd. The searchlights 
threw their shafts over Hoboken, New York and Brooklyn, 
the sirens of the steamers whistled and howled, telephones 
rang, telegraphs played — New York, Chicago, San Francisco 
buzzed, the excited joy of the whole world accompanied Allan 
on his journey. All over the world there was a simultaneous 
cessation of all factory work for five minutes in honor of 
the occasion. For five minutes, all steamers at that moment 
plowing the waves of the oceans, and all railway trains 
upon all continents sent forth shrill signals of universal 
rejoicing over the great event: a concerted overwhelming 
shout of the triumph of labor throughout the world. 

Lloyd undressed and went to bed. 

They were on their way. 

In the hotels thousands of people had dined at ten o’clock 
and talked with enthusiastic interest of the impending start. 
Bands played. The fever grew and grew. People became 
excited, and even waxed poetical. 


320 


THE TUNNEL 


At ten minutes to twelve the Edison-Biograph suddenly- 
flashed out Silence ! 

At once all was still. The Tele-Cinematograph started to ' 
work. And in all the big cities of the world at that same 
moment the hall of Hoboken station was to be seen, black 
with people: the Tunnel-train — Allan saying good-by to 
Ethel and his son — ^the onlookers throwing their hats into 
the air — ^the train gliding out of the station. 

An indescribable, thundering shout of joy lasting for 
mmutes was heard. People got up on the tables, hundreds 
of champagne glasses were smashed and stamped on. The 
music fell in with the Tunnel song : Three cheers and a 

Tiger for Mac . . But the noise was so tremendous that 
none was able to hear anything of the music. 

Then began a new series on the Biograph screen. Allan 
when he started his work, Allan as he looked to-day. Hobby, 
Strom, Harriman, Barmann, Woolf, ^^fat^^ Muller, Lloyd. 
Then the film proper started. It began with the meeting in 
the roof-garden of the Atlantic,” the first thrust of the 
spade,” all the different phases of the building of the Tunnel 
— and whenever the figure of Allan was seen the wildest en- 
thusiasm would break out again. 

At one o’clock a telegram appeared on the projection plate : 

Allan had passed into the Tunnel. Terrific enthusiasm of 
the crowd ! Several people hurt in the crush ! ” 

The film continued, interrupted every half hour by tele- 
grams. A hundred miles have been covered ! Two hundred ! 
Allan stops for a minute. The betting became fast and 
furious. Nobody looked at the film any more. Everybody 
was counting, betting, yelling ! Would Allan get to Bermuda 
punctually? Allan’s first journey had become a race. The 
record devil raved! In the first hour Allan had lowered 
the record for electric trains which had been held by the 
Berlin — Hamburg trains. In the second hour he got danger- 
ously near the flying-machines’ world records, in the third 
he had beaten them. At five o’clock there was a new sensa- 
tion: a view of the station of Bermuda in beautiful sun- 
shine with great masses of people, all looking in the same 


CONCLUSION 


321 


direction. The gray Tunnel train comes dashing in at twelve 
minutes past five. 

Allan gets out, talks to Strom and then both of them get 
back into the train. Five minutes and the train starts. A 
telegram : Allan reaches Bermuda two minutes late.’’ 

Some of the banqueters went home after this, but most 
remained. They kept awake more than forty-eight hours 
to follow Allan’s journey. A good many had taken rooms 
in the hotels and lay down to get a couple of hours’ sleep, 
having given orders to be awakened immediately ^^in case 
anything should happen.” 

Allan was on his way. 

The train dashed through the galleries. In the curves it 
heeled over on one side like a yacht: it sailed. When the 
track went upwards it rose as easily and quietly as a fiying 
machine: it flew. The lights in the obscure Tunnel were 
clefts in the dark, the signal lamps multicolored stars, the 
lights of the stations meteors whizzing past. The Tunnel- 
men — fortified behind the iron shutters of the stations — 
hardy fellows who had looked on the October catastrophe 
with dry eyes, shed tears of joy when they saw ^^old Mac” 
flying past. 

Lloyd had given orders to be awakened at eight o’clock. 
He had his bath, breakfasted and smoked a cigar. He 
laughed — ^this was what he liked. At last he was undisturbed, 
at last he was far away from people and in a place where 
none could get at him. Now and again he walked through 
his brilliantly lit compartment, twelve state rooms, and filled 
with pure fresh air. At nine o’clock Ethel telephoned to 
him and he talked with her for ten minutes. Don’t smoke 
too much. Dad,” Ethel said.) Then he read the telegrams. 
All of a sudden the train stopped. They were held up at 
the big station in the hot galleries.” Lloyd looked through 
a peep hole and saw a group of people in the middle of 
which Allan was standing. 

Lloyd dined and slept and again the train stopped. The 
windows of his saloon were open: he looked through a glass 
wall out into a blue sea and on the other side he saw a 


323 


THE THNHEL 


boundless crowd of people who shouted and cried, mad with 
enthusiasm. The Azores. His servant told him they were 
delayed forty minutes on account of an oil tank having sprung 
a leak. 

After this the windows were again shut. The train rushed 
into the depths and old dried-up little Lloyd began to whistle 
for joy, a thing he had not done for twenty years. 

From the Azores Strom drove. He changed at once into 
full power and the speed sign rose to two hundred and ninety- 
five miles an hour. The engineers became restless, but Strom, 
who may have lost his hair in the hot galleries, had kept 
his nerves and did not allow any one to interfere. 

^^It would be a shame if we arrived late,’^ he said. The 
train flew so fast that it seemed to be standing still; the 
lights passed by like sparks. 

Finisterre ! 

It was night again in New York. The hotels were filled. 
Enthusiasm raged as the telegram told of the extraordinary 
speed. The betting became mad. 

Allan drove for the last fifty miles. He had not slept for 
twenty-five hours but the excitement kept him up. He 
looked pale and exhausted, absorbed rather than elated : many 
things passed through his head 

In a few minutes they would arrive! The signal lamps 
dashed past, the train flew — 

Suddenly their eyes were dazzled by glaring light. The 
day broke in. Allan stopped. 

They had arrived in Europe twelve minutes late. 


THE END 


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